


Swimmers in the Sea of Inevitability

by apollos



Category: South Park
Genre: Break Up, Eventual Happy Ending, Getting Back Together, High School, M/M, Post-Break Up, Reunions, Snowed In, Truth or Dare
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-16
Updated: 2019-04-16
Packaged: 2019-05-07 20:17:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 22,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14678709
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apollos/pseuds/apollos
Summary: Craig ends his and Tweek's relationship abruptly before the start of high school, breaking Tweek's heart and causing Tweek to retreat into himself. Years of confusion come to a head at a solely South Park senior year Christmas party blowout.





	1. Chapter 1

**Part I. Lazy Rivers**   
  


 

Things had gotten too easy, too nice, and Tweek had gotten complacent. He would learn to never let himself ignore the little things that grew at the corner of his eyes and inside his head again.

He woke to morning sunlight filtering in through the window, the blankets pushed on the floor. It was the dead of summer, the doldrums of summer, the dog days of summer, the weeks that felt endless while you were living them but in retrospect had passed by so fast. They wore shorts and tank tops everywhere, flip-flops barely thick enough to keep out the burning pavement, sunglasses pushing their bangs off their face, cold water bottles passed around like military grade relief packages. He and Craig had fallen asleep last night not because they had  _wanted_ to go to sleep, but because it was too hot to do much else. They'd curled up on the separate ends of Tweek's mattress, too sticky and sweaty to attempt to hold each other, the only point of contact their intertwined ankles and the single blanket across their midsections. But now it was morning, Tweek was awake, the blanket was on the floor and Craig was not in bed beside him.

He sat up and rubbed at his eyes, confused. Craig never woke up before him. Perhaps he had gone to the bathroom. Tweek checked his phone; it was just after nine o'clock in the morning, early for a summer waking, but they'd fallen asleep just after midnight the night previous. They would have been up early today, anyway, since his mother was taking him and Craig to a waterpark that was having a fourteen-to-eighteen-year-old special.

Tweek got up, stretching. He wanted a shower; he could feel sweat pooled in the arms of his t-shirt, the creases where his thighs met his pelvis. Perhaps Craig had had the same idea, but Tweek couldn't hear the upstairs bathroom's shower, as he would be able to if Craig were in it. And when he went to brush his teeth, Craig wasn't there, either.

He went downstairs next. His mother was in the kitchen, washing dishes from last night's dinner; his father was at the shop. "Where's Craig?" Tweek asked around a yawn.

"He's out back," his mother said, plainly and pleasantly. At this point, Tweek felt a creeping sense of paranoia, as if he'd waken up in an alternate, twisted universe. He brushed it off, as paranoia was not uncommon for Tweak, but there was a sharp and urgent edge that morning that he did not like. "He said he'd meet you in the hammock."

Tweek got a glass of water and took a granola bar before heading out back. The hammock was a recent addition to his backyard, begged for by him. He liked to nap and read in it, and he and Craig liked to lay together and coo and peck like nested lovebirds. He found Craig there, his eyes closed and hands folded over his stomach as if he were asleep. While Tweek was still in his sleep pants and t-shirt, Craig was fully dressed in mid-thigh shorts and a striped tank top.

"Hey," Tweek said, hoisting himself into the hammock. Craig scooted to make room for him but did not open his eyes. "Why are you up so early?"

"Couldn't sleep," Craig mumbled. Their sides together, the heat was already becoming unbearable, so Tweek ate his granola bar and did not try to move further towards Craig.

"The heat, right?" Tweek asked. "It's awful. I'm so sweaty."

"God, it is  _bad_ ," Craig groaned. "It has me feeling so weird. My head is so heavy and my eyes aren't working right."

"The waterpark will help today," Tweek said cheerfully. "I'm excited."

"Yeah, me too." Craig opened his eyes at last, half-smiling at Tweek. "Your mom said we could stop at McDonald's on the way."

Tweek scrunched his nose.

"I know, you hate it," Craig said. He moved his hand as if he were to touch Tweek, but stopped; at the time, Tweek excused it as being due to the heat, as he excused so many things that summer. "But I like Mickey D's."

"I  _definitely_  hate it when you call it that," Tweek said. He swallowed the last of his granola bar. "Like you're—I don't know, some kid in the 60s!"

Craig laughed, a slow sound that rolled out of his mouth like a tumbleweed skipping across the desert. Tweek smiled; he always loved making Craig laugh.

"When are we leaving?" Craig asked.

"I think soon. My mom will come out and get us when she wants us to get ready."

"'Kay." Craig stretched out and yawn. "Let's sleep some more."

Craig fell asleep instantly, but Tweek didn't. Instead, he turned on his side and curled up, thankful for the opportunity to stare at Craig. That was quickly becoming one of his favorite activities. That summer, the one between eighth and ninth grade, Tweek and Craig and all their friends seemed to change every time they saw one another. Growing taller, sprouting hair along their upper lips, voices deepening. Not everybody—Kenny, for example, still had the height of a child, and Clyde's voice stayed as awful as always—but a lot of them. Tweek himself had outgrown all his long pants, and his shorts were just a tad too high up on his thighs and uncomfortable around his crotch. Craig seemed mostly the same; there was just  _more_ of him, his legs and arms long, and he had an appetite that Tweek marveled at, able to put away amounts of food that Tweek was sure would make him sick but never did.

The other noticeable thing that had changed that summer about Craig made Tweek redden just to think of it, and again it came down to the heat. Having spent the last four years or so around Craig most of the time, Tweek had gotten used to the way he smelled. Tweek had never  _hated_ it, but he'd never  _cared_ that Craig smelled like mint toothpaste and grocery store brand shampoo. Now, though, as they passed their days sweating and kissing in equal amounts, Tweek picked up something  _different_ about Craig. It rolled off him most prominently when they were kissing seriously—not in the hammock or in their living rooms or at night in their bedrooms with their doors forced open by their parents, but in hidden corners around town where nobody could find them. It was something that Tweek spent a lot of time thinking about, turning over and over in his mind. Even now, as this occurred to him and he hovered as close to Craig as possible to get the smell but not disturb his sleep, he felt his body seize all the way to his toes, his heart turn to stone in his chest. He breathed out slowly, moved back and put a hand to his own cheek, feeling the blush that would surely rise there.

Tweek was worried about high school. Of course he was. He and Craig, and the rest of the South Park kids, would be funneled into Park County High, alongside all the other kids from the various Parks and other small towns. There would be a lot of people he did not know; a lot of people he would have to be  _explained_ to. And though having Craig with him was a blessing, he worried, too, what the other kids might say about them being together. They might have tricked an entire town into accepting them, but Tweek knew South Park was different, and that everybody from South Park was different in a way that he could not acknowledge but not understand. There'd be other small mountain town hicks at Park County High, not  _their_ small mountain town hicks. Yet the heat, as thick and scratchy as a woolen blanket hung over everything in South Park, dulled any anxiety he might feel in that moment, thinking about all this.

After twenty minutes of staring at Craig, of counting his eyelashes and pondering the single, large freckle (beauty mark?) hidden under his chin, Tweek's mother came into the backyard. She was drying her hands with a dishtowel and saying, "Boys! Time to get ready!"

They dressed separately, Craig changing his shorts for his bathing suit in the bathroom while Tweek put his own bathing suit and a clean t-shirt on in his bedroom. Tweek's mother had packed their towels, sunscreen, water, snacks and anything else they might need, and all that Craig and Tweek had to do was make sure they had their phones and phone chargers and put their sunglasses and flip-flops on.

Tweek rode in the backseat of his mom's Honda with Craig, holding his hand. Craig dozed, his head falling on top of Tweek's since he was too tall to lay it on Tweek's shoulder, while Tweek chatted with his mom. She was full of gossip, having talked to Sheila Broflovski earlier that morning, and Tweek entertained her. The nice, quiet domesticity of the car, his mother's steady driving and Craig's soft snores, as tiny as a rabbit's, made Tweek want to be charitable, to be nice, to even be  _mature_.

They did stop at McDonald's. They even got out to eat inside instead of going through the drive-through. Tweek ordered a black coffee—all things aside, McDonald's had pretty good coffee—while Craig got two Sausage McMuffins with hash browns and his mother a yogurt parfait. The inside of the McDonald's was nicer than Tweek thought it would be, tasteful brown furniture and framed art on the wall, and they sat a surprisingly clean table by the big windows.

"You must be eating your mother out of house and home!" Tweek's mom said to Craig, laughing.

Craig shrugged.

"One day, Tweek will catch up." Tweek looked at her, slightly embarrassed. Tweek's appetite had always been birdlike, scarce, and he had been ashamed of that this summer, especially next to Craig. Another example of things that were so simple, so routine, that he would blow up and analyze in his painful, second-by-second recollection of this day in the years coming.

"It's the heat! It's too hot to eat. I don't know how he's doing it." Tweek and Craig were sitting next to each other in the booth, his mother across from them, and he looked at Craig. He had spread the wrappers of the breakfast sandwiches out to minimize mess, one of the prissy things Craig did that Tweek felt like only he noticed.

Tweek's mother just laughed, and then turned to Craig. "Do you want to come and visit Tweek's grandparents with us in a few weeks?" she asked.

Tweek blushed, this time not out of embarrassment but appreciation. The grandparents his mother was referring to were her own parents, who had relocated to a small ranch in Wyoming to live out their retirement. They went and visited them every summer, and usually the trips bored Tweek to death, though he liked feeding the cows and petting (not riding) the horses. The chickens and roosters, though, terrified him, and he had to sleep in the same room as his parents on a trundle bed. To have Craig there would be amazing. They could sit under the stars, wander the small acreage, and he could impress Craig with his very minimal knowledge of ranching.

"I'll have to ask my parents," Craig said.

"If you need me to talk to them, just let me know," Tweek's mother said. "Tweek's told you about the ranch, hasn't he?"

Craig nodded. "It sounds cool," he said. Tweek smiled, because he knew the way he'd described it to Craig had been anything  _but_ cool. "Mind-numbing" and "soul-sucking" were Tweek's favorite adjectives in that regard.

"It'd be so great if you came," Tweek said, getting attached to the idea but also forming the precognition that it would not occur. "You'd love it."

"Tweek always gets so bored. There's no cell service there. But my parents do have a landline, so you would be able to call home."

Craig nodded, his mouth full. Tweek touched his thigh under the table, very appreciative in that moment of his well-mannered, handsome boyfriend, and he tried not to show it on his face when Craig moved his leg away. Tweek told himself that he hadn't meant to do it, that it was unconscious, and that it didn't mean anything, even though they were always holding hands or each other's legs under tables.

The air conditioning in McDonald's was cranked too high, even considering the temperature outside, Tweek's coffee going cold quickly in his hands. He could feel the air on the back of his neck, eliciting goosebumps. He had a sense of looking at himself in the third person. He began to feel as if he were in a horror movie. He expected screeching chords, an orchestra playing much too fast, flickering black and white lights, somebody smashing through the window—Death on his horse.

None of that happened. They finished their food and threw it away, then went back into Tweek's mom's Honda and finished the last leg of their journey. Craig was awake now, talking to Tweek's mom about school supply shopping and other things Tweek did not quite hear. He had gone quiet. He was hearing the music in the back of his head, the paranoia that had occurred to him earlier that morning now sitting itself on his shoulders. Craig seemed to have noticed, but his hand felt like a dead fish in Tweek's, no warmth or life to be exchanged between them. Tweek swore he could smell decay.

At the park Tweek's mom paid for them all, Craig and Tweek standing behind her and trying their best to not look associated. Fellow teenagers were running about, all trying to keep their cool in a similar manner, flashes of summer-tanned skin and sunglasses. Tweek gazed at them, trying to place himself in one, two, three years, failing. Even as far ahead as Wyoming in a few weeks seemed like something that could only happen to somebody else, something that Tweek would hear about second- or thirdhand.

They parked themselves at a set of beach chairs by a little faux-beach area, the ground painted to look like sand. It led into a pool with a wavemaker that Tweek eyed suspiciously. Tweek's mother forced them to put sunscreen on, but at least it was the type that came out of a spray bottle. Tweek did Craig's back and Craig did Tweek's in return. Tweek tried to fight his mother on the face sunscreen but lost, feeling stupid as he rubbed it into his nose.

His mother, her own sunscreen applied, sat on a lawn chair. She pulled a thick Kristin Hannah novel from her bag and leaned back. "Remember to come back here if you get hungry or thirsty, boys," she said. "Otherwise, we'll meet here at four. Do you have your phone?"

Tweek nodded, pulling it out of his swim shorts. It was in a special waterproof case, one that had a string he could wear around his neck but refused to.

"Okay. Have fun!" His mother smiled at them, and they were released.

They walked off without a purpose, Tweek bumping the back of his hand against Craig's in an attempt to signal that he wanted to hold hands. Craig, apparently, did not. That was alright; they were surrounded by unfamiliar people, and they always ran the risk of harassment. It was stupid, and it pissed them both off, but sometimes it was easier to just fly under the radar than to deal with it. Tweek, at least, wanted to have a good, fun day.

"Let's go on that." Craig pointed to a large, wide slide that people seemed to be riding down in two or four-person tubes. It was in a section of the park that had been outfitted to look like a tropical rainforest, the slide itself a deep wood brown, the tubes green.

"I don't know," Tweek said. "That looks fucking scary."

"It'll be fine." Craig smiled at him. An underused muscle in Tweek's chest clenched. Craig smiled at him all the time and Tweek had almost gotten used to it, but it could still knock him off-guard, especially on a day where he was already feeling uneasy.

"I guess," Tweek said. He peered at the wooden stairs leading up to the slide. "The line doesn't look too long."

"Probably 'cause they're all on the really big slides," Craig said. Tweek nodded. There were other, taller waterslides around the park that Tweek had little interest in. They were making their way to the lazy river, the best part of the park, where Tweek hoped they would float for hours.

They climbed up half the stairs, then stood in line behind a large group of older guys. They must have been eighteen or so, muscles rippling across their wide shoulders, wearing fashionably short bathing suits and exposing the golden skin of their thighs. Tweek exchanged a look with Craig that he hoped would communicate  _look at these guys_ , but Craig just shrugged in response.

Despite the small amount of people,the line moved slowly. Tweek was starting to sweat. He and Craig weren't talking—not in a pointed way, but just because there was nothing to say, or so Tweek thought at the time. He rested his body weight against the railing of the stairs when they weren't shuffling just a few steps at a time, staring out at the park around them. It seemed much smaller from up here; Tweek could see the road to his left, hear the low thrum of car tires on asphalt.

Finally they were at the top. There was a bored-looking teenage girl wearing unflattering shorts and a red one-piece bathing suit working the ride, various lifeguard gear around her feet. "Two people?" she asked them, after sending the guys in front of her to the four-person line. "Take one of the tubes and go to the right."

"Do you want to go in front or back?" Craig asked, grabbing a tube from the side. There seemed to be somebody tasked with running them up and down the stairs, which seemed inefficient to Tweek.

Tweek thought about it. "The back," he said.

"Alright. I'll get in first."

They walked over to the slide. Craig got in with grace, but Tweek was more awkward, nearly falling. The girl working the slide looked at him with what Tweek thought was disgust, and that hot, sudden, strong embarrassment known only to young teenagers seized Tweek.

That was soon forgotten, though, as they started on the ride. It was faster than it looked. Tweek disregarded the proper position and leaned forward, wrapping his arms around Craig's midsection. His skin was slick from sweat and the spray of the waterslide, but Tweek held on for dear life, pressing his mouth shut so he wouldn't scream. The embarrassment creeped back—he felt like such a  _child_ , and he was  _not_ having fun. At one point, Craig murmured "This is awful," and Tweek nodded against his back.

They splashed into a small pool, and that was it. They both jumped out of the tube and walked the distance to the return area. The older boys that had been in front of them were nowhere to be seen.

"Sorry," Craig said as they tossed their tube in with the rest. "I thought it would be fun."

Tweek shrugged. "It's not your fault," he said.

Wordlessly, they waked along the path to the lazy river. The concrete path was hot underneath their feet, Tweek walking on his tiptoes to try and minimize the pain. They'd left their shoes with Tweek's mom. The myriad of trees planted around the park kept a lot of the sun out, except on these paths with no shade, and they crossed a small bridge over the lazy river that was particularly hot, Tweek feeling as if he were walking on coals.

"My fucking  _feet_ ," he said to Craig. Whined, more like. Again, this is something Tweek would remember, would analyze—did he whine too much? Was that the problem? Had Craig finally grown sick of it?

They waded into one of the entrance areas of the lazy river. It was long, winding around the length of the park and had a few different entrances and exits. It was decently full, groups of teenagers clustered together. Tweek spied other couples but as far as he could tell, none of them were gay. Despite this, he grabbed onto Craig's hand as soon as they were both in their tubes.

"Like otters," Craig said.

"What?"

"Otters hold hands when they fall asleep. So they don't drift away from each other."

Tweek smiled at him, and he felt one of those sudden shocks of love that could bring you to your feet. "So we're otters," he said, squeezing Craig's hand.

"We're otters," Craig agreed, and he smiled at him. Another image that would forever stick in Tweek's mind. He thought Craig looked honestly happy. He thought Craig was being sweet.

The lazy river moved along slowly, more slowly because of the amount of people. The good thing about it, though, was that you passed under caves. The caves had misters in them, keeping you cool. A few peered into the pools of other rides, a few into aquariums, and one even showed you the inside of the tank where there were small, grey-and-white dolphins you could watch swim. That was Craig's favorite, Tweek knew, from their previous excursions to this waterpark. But that wasn't coming up for a while. For now they leaned their heads back and closed their eyes, feeling the high sun on their faces and each other's hands, the sounds of other people chattering and birds squawking fading into a soothing white noise as their tubes bumped against each other in the water.

They went around the river like this once together, not even noticing the dolphin tank. Tweek was pretty sure, in fact, that he'd fallen asleep at some point. He woke up to the feeling of many people jostling him, and saw that they were at the busiest entrance, the one near the front of the park.

"We'll stay on," Craig said, blinking his eyes open as if he, too, were tired.

"Yeah," Tweek agreed. "I'm having a really nice time."

"Me too," Craig said. (Lied.)

This time they were more awake, though they still weren't exactly making conversation. They passed through the first few sets of caves and Tweek commented on the fish, trying to get Craig to talk, but the most he got were  _yeah'_ s or  _cool_ 's. Finally, when they went into the dark, long, dolphin cave, Tweek tried something. The lazy river was good for this, private when not filled with people, and it was a lot emptier this time around, many gone to lunch. This was why it was a favorite spot for teenagers.

Tweek grabbed Craig's upper thigh, his face burning.

They hadn't tried this yet. They had been slow when it came to their relationship; Tweek was scared of a lot of it, and Craig was patient. They had French kissed, and there had been some innocent and mostly involuntary dry humping, and once Craig had stuck his hands down the back of Tweek's pajamas and squeezed his ass, but they'd never touched each other  _there_. They talked about it as a plan of something to do eventually, much like they talked about going to college and living in a big city penthouse. It was something Tweek thought of as an inevitability; something that he did not feel he needed to rush, because it would happen when it would happen. And in this cool, calm lazy river cave, where the dolphins Craig loved were swimming and a length of hidden, tucked-away river awaited them, Tweek thought he would be able to open up the conversation. Not actually  _do_ anything; but provide a promise of something to come later.

Craig looked at the hand on his thigh with an expression Tweek was not used to seeing: disgust. "No," he said. "No. Let's not."

"I mean…there's nobody around," Tweek said, blushing deeply.

"It's not that." Craig sighed, his eyes closing. Tweek released his grip on Craig's thigh but did not move it, scared to stop touching him. Scared that he would float away like a sleeping otter.

"Then what is it?" Tweek asked. "Are you feeling alright?"

"Yeah, Tweek, I'm fine. It's just…"

"Just what, Craig?" Tweek's heart, which had been beating fast with a small thrill, was now beating much more quickly with fear. Again he heard the screeching chords of the orchestra in his mind.

Craig opened his eyes and set them on Tweek, and despite the heat Tweek froze. "I don't want to do this anymore," Craig said. "I don't want to be gay anymore. With you. I don't want to be your boyfriend."

They drifted out of the cave, then, and Tweek thought that was about the most symbolic thing that had ever happened to him. This part of the lazy river was deeply shaded, leaves dropped into the water from the trees above, but Tweek could at once feel the sun boring into him. It was as if what Craig said had echoed:  _I don't want to be your boyfriend, I don't want to be your boyfriend, I don't want to be your boyfriend_.

"What?" Tweek asked eventually, blinking.

"I said, I don't want to be your boyfriend. Please take your hand off my thigh."

Tweek did, and for some reason he decided to dip it in the water, as if he could clean himself of Craig's disgust. "Why?" Tweek asked, trying hard not to start twitching and screaming and flailing.

"I'm not gay," Craig said. "I'm sorry." He was not sorry.

"But, Craig." Tweek blinked at him. He wanted to fight, but was already feeling defeated, knowing it would be no good. You could not force somebody to want you. But—but—but—

The sun blazed on. Craig waited. Disconnected, their tubes started to drift towards different sides of the river.

"I love you!" He jerked aggressively, nearly falling out of the water. He knew it meant it as soon as it came running out his mouth. He loved Craig, he did, with all the intensity you could only muster up for your first love, your greatest love.

And then Craig said possibly the worst thing he could: "That's too bad, Tweek."

Tweek sighed, a violent exhalation bordering on a scream. He grabbed the side of his tubes, willing himself not to jerk and fall, willing himself not to turn this into an even greater disaster. "So we're not boyfriends anymore?"

"Were we ever, really?" Craig chuckled lowly. "I mean, wasn't it all fake?"

"Bullshit!" Tweek glared at Tweek. "Fucking bullshit, Craig!"

"It was fake in the start," Craig said, clarifying. "And a relationship that's fake in the start can only go so far."

"Oh, yeah, you're real wise." Shock worn off, anger was starting to curdle in Tweek's chest like milk left out in the sun, thick and nauseating. "You're real fucking mature, Craig. Listen to you."

"Jesus Christ, Tweek," Craig said, but he didn't elaborate. Instead, he looked down the river. "Let's get off here."

Tweek thought about saying no, letting Craig get out and wander around the park and do whatever the fuck he wanted to, but he couldn't stand the idea of drifting along the lazy river by himself, pouting like a little baby. His mother had also warned them not to get separated; they were still young, susceptible, in the kidnapping age range. Tweek didn't want to disappoint his mother. He wanted to run to her and let her hold him while he pouted like the baby he must be, while he cried, because he loved Craig and now Craig wasn't his boyfriend anymore.

Of course, Tweek could not flee the awful hell his life had transformed to immediately. They were an hour from South Park and it was only around noon, much earlier than they had planned to leave the park. That was perhaps the cruelest part of all of this—he felt trapped and alone, despite the large number of people bustling around them. He felt anonymous in a mass of already anonymous people. A statistic, like the victim of a massacre.

They walked back to Tweek's mother's chair together, keeping their distance, the pathway burning holes into Tweek's feet as his eyes burned with the struggle not to cry. The whole time he was trying to figure out a way of telling his mother without letting Craig see him do it, and finally he remembered he could text her. He fell back from Craig, pulled his phone out of his pocket and texted his mother:  _Craig broke up with me we need to leave plzplzplzplzplzplzplz_

Half a minute later he got the response, a simple  _Okay_.

Tweek kept behind Craig as they made the last leg of this dreadful journey. This was the last time he would be able to really stare at him, he thought. They could not be friends; Tweek could not stomach that, not after that declaration of love. He remembered that morning in the hammock, remembered the single freckle underneath Craig's chin, and stared at his back. Craig was skinny, the result of growing too fast without accumulating enough mass. He had cool undertones to his skin, but when he tanned it was to a beautiful color, and Tweek stared at his back, at the way his spine was  _just_ visible, and tried to memorize the hue of his summer tan and the way his hair shagged just a bit down his neck. He could not believe it, could not believe that this boy was no longer free to touch and to talk to.

Tweek's mother looked up from the book she had clearly been pretending to read, and Tweek could see that she was making an effort to keep her face as passive as possible. "Oh, boys!" she said. "I'm so glad to see you. I was just trying to call Tweek. Richard called me, he needs me back at the shop. I'm so sorry, we can come back another day."

Tweek never loved his mother as much as he did in that moment.

"That's fine," Craig said. "I don't feel well."

"It's probably the heat, sweetie. Maybe you needed more sunscreen. You have such delicate skin."

They gathered their things and walked, Tweek keeping close to his mother. He did not care what the other teenagers littering the waterpark might think when he saw them; right now Tweek wanted comfort, and he knew that he would not be able to receive it until Craig had been dropped off at home and he were alone with his mother in the house. She would make him coffee and hold him, probably. Perhaps this would be the last great childish breakdown Tweek's mother could comfort him through. The thought pained him, not because of that, but because that was Craig's destiny now—he would be relegated to a part of Tweek's childhood, and not a part of his actual  _life_. Tweek did not have the maturity to fully form that thought in that moment, but looking back, he understands that this is what had upset him the most in that moment. The long, winding stretch of future, empty without Craig, without his hand to cling to so he could not drift too far away.

 

 

_I have lost you, my lover, in the black sea of inevitability._


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey guys, i'm going on vacation for pretty much the next month. the final chapter of this will in all likelihood not be until early july. in the meantime, enjoy the mess of cliches this has become.

**Part II. Otters, Drifting Apart**

 

 

Friday, lunch. Tweek is sitting at his usual table with Jimmy, picking through a Caesar salad. Esther, their other usual lunchtime companion and Jimmy's girlfriend, is running late. Jimmy is not concerned. He and Tweek are discussing a particularly difficult essay that has been assigned for their English class. Tweek feels the usual dullness of depression he does whenever he's in the lunchroom—it's not a spike, but like a blunt instrument that has long since lost its use and thus has been thrown away pressing into his stomach. His senses are hyperaware, and he swears he can hear Craig, Token and Clyde at their table, talking and laughing and living their now separate lives. They're five tables away from them; Tweek knows the exact angle he would have to turn to see Craig, and every day he fights the battle not to do so. Most days he succeeds. Rarely, he'll catch Craig's eyes, and then he and Jimmy will hurry out of the cafeteria and take the rest of their lunch with one of their favorite, understanding teachers.

"It's just b-b-bullshit," Jimmy says, catching Tweek's attention again. Tweek's eyes focus in on Jimmy's face. "Christmas break st-st-starts in a week. That's not enough t-t-time."

"I know," Tweek says, focusing his energy back to the essay. "Eight pages! What is this, college?"

Jimmy laughs, though it wasn't that funny. "Ha-have you heard back from anywhere?"

Tweek shakes his head. "I didn't apply ED," he said, "so I won't hear back until—the spring!" He twitches at the thought of college, hating himself for it. Jimmy's stutter and Tweek's twitches: two things that have stayed and that have separated them from the rest after leaving South Park for Park County High School. "You too, right?"

"I'm th-th-thinking about deferring," Jimmy says. "Taking a gap year."

"What would you do?" Tweek asks, eyes blowing wide.

"Grow my You-YouTube," Jimmy says. "And then maybe, I wouldn't have to go."

Tweek nods; that makes sense. Jimmy's marginally popular, with forty-thousand subscribers on the sketch comedy YouTube he shares with the other members of Park County High School's Improv Comedy Club. Tweek has been offered roles in the sketches but has historically declined. He doesn't think himself a particularly funny person, and he does  _not_ want his person on the Internet, forever preserved, doing something embarrassing. The sketches are good, but Jimmy and the rest employ a lot of shock and physical humor, the type of stuff panic attacks are made of.

"I don't know what I'm doing," Tweek says. He folds his arms on the table and lays his head on them. "God—can we not talk about this? I'm getting so stressed out."

"Okay," Jimmy says. "What do you want to talk about instead?"

"I don't know," Tweek says.

"Craig?"

Tweek lifts his head to glare at him.

"So no Cr-Craig today," Jimmy says. He mimes making a note on an imaginary sketch pad.

"There's nothing  _new_ ," Tweek says, now wanting to talk about Craig that Jimmy's brought it up. Without Esther to steer their conversations into all sorts of strange territory, he and Jimmy usually fall back on Craig. After all, he'd broken Tweek's heart, and when the social split had occurred in high school Jimmy had ended up on Tweek's side. "Everything's been so quiet since he stopped dating Melissa."

"She's with Kenny now," Jimmy supplies, as if Tweek doesn't already know that. He has spent many nights stalking Melissa Dupont's Facebook page. Despite her rather American first name, she moved to Colorado from France as a young child and still has an accent. Her clothes are fine, made of linen, and she has fashionably short hair. On Facebook there's a lot of pictures of her in the French countryside from her summer vacations, and Tweek's just glad that none of them include Craig. They had dated for six months and broken up at the beginning of this school year. Tweek has never spoken to her.

"I talked to Clyde to-today," Jimmy continues. He frowns.

"What?" Tweek squawks, jerking. The freshman girl sitting at the table next to him look, giggling.

"He asked me for help in ma-math class." Jimmy sighs and slams back the rest of his school-provided chocolate milk like it's alcohol.

Tweek sighs, too. Of course.

"But, hey!" Jimmy says, smiling as he lowers his milk carton. "It's the week-weekend! Want to sleep over?"

"I have to work," Tweek says glumly.

"You can come over after," Jimmy offers. "I don't have any other plans."

"What about Esther?"

"We're going on a date tonight," Jimmy says. "She has a lot of ho-ho-homework for the weekend."

Tweek nods. Esther takes Advanced Placement classes, while he and Jimmy are in the awful melting pot of general education. Tweek's grades are passable. He's not expecting to hear positive things back from many of the school he's applied to, his applications written under extreme stress and lots of caffeine, and he doesn't know what he wants to do after graduation. He supposes he'll continue working at Tweak Bros. and take it over when his dad dies, but the thought of that depresses and distresses him.

"We'll see," Tweek says eventually. Hanging out with Jimmy is good enough—in fact, he classifies Jimmy as his best friend—but all he wants to do this weekend is mope around, watch the same three anime on repeat and jack off to gay porn.

"You've been so down lately," Jimmy says, as if he's just read Tweek's mind. "It'll do you g-good to get out."

Tweek shrugs.

"Kevin and I are wri-writing a new sketch. There's a part in it that's not t-too bad. No slapstick."

"It's not the slapstick," Tweek says. "It's—I don't want to be on the internet, Jimmy! Don't you remember North Korea?"

"That was different," Jimmy says, frowning. "This is—fun!"

"What the fuck is  _fun_ ," Tweek says, and even he knows that that's overdramatic. He groans and twitches. Thankfully the twitch is small and mostly in his hands, grabbing ahold of the table.

"Come on, Tweek."

Tweek shakes his head. "I'll come over," he says, feeling bad.

"I can invite Kevin, and we can play Ca-Cataan," Jimmy says. He seems excited by the idea, so Tweek nods. The Kevin Jimmy is referring to is not Kevin Stoley, who has taken one of Jimmy and Tweek's vacant spots in Craig's gang, but a kid named Kevin Perry. He's a year under them and has terrible cystic acne. Tweek doesn't care for him much, but Jimmy likes him, and besides Esther that's the extent of Tweek's social circle.

But these plans do not come to fruition, because Esther comes in all beaming and bustling. Once popular, she was separated from the rest when her father died from aggressive lung cancer and she got weird about it, retreating into herself and gaining a bunch of weight. The weight's mostly gone, and she's fairly pretty, but social ties are difficult to reestablish when broken. Tweek does like her; she's nice, a good girlfriend to Jimmy. There's an energy around her today that's concerning, though. She launches into a speech before she's even fully seated.

"Okay, so Bebe's hosting this pre-Christmas get together this weekend up at her grandfather's cabin! And it's  _just_ South Park kids. She says it's like, this last winter get-together? Since we're all going away in the spring? But the thing is, guys, we're  _invited_." She smiles even wider. "Bebe talked to me  _personally_! Okay, so it was over Facebook messenger, but  _still_!"

Jimmy smiles at her, and at first Tweek just feels annoyed, and then something occurs to him. All South Park kids, and so— "Is Craig going to be there?"

"Of course," Esther says, her smile weakening. She knows all about what they refer to as Craig and Tweek's  _history_. She has acted as a liaison, drawing gossip from her Advanced Placement friends who have ties to those whom they refer to as the "cool" kids.

"Then no." Tweek folds his arms.

"Come on, it'll be fun!"

"You can't avoid him forever, Tweek," Jimmy says, gently.

"I can," Tweek says. "And I will."

"You're being petulant," Esther says, harrumphing. When Tweek and Jimmy look at her, she clarifies: "Childishly stubborn."

"You guys just don't understand!" Tweek yelps. He lowers his voice, not wanting to draw attention, not wanting others to hear, though at times he thinks everybody knows about him and Craig. That people pity him, but also are disgusted by him. "It's—Craig's an asshole, okay? I can't have a good time with him there. I just can't."

"Not to be mean, sweetheart," Esther says, reaching a hand as an invitation. Tweek looks at it and keeps his arms folded. "But this might be our only social chance before we leave for college."

"I really don't  _care_ ," Tweek says. "I'm fine! With just my friends now!"

"It might be fu-fun," Jimmy offers, looking between Esther and Tweek. Settling on Tweek, he says, "And—Tweek—no offense, you know I love you—but Craig will probably just ig-ignore you."

"Like always," Tweek sighs. He has made a point of not speaking to Craig since the day they broke up, but Craig hasn't been forthcoming, either. He'd dropped off the radar, and then when they resurfaced at school, said nothing to Tweek. Even though their last names put them beside each other at homeroom, and at every standardized test since. And that was enough.

"Look." Esther gives him a pointed glance. "I know Craig's an asshole, alright? He's an asshole to everybody, not just you. He was an asshole to Melissa!"

Tweek's ears perk. "Do you know anything new?" he asks.

Esther shakes her head. "This isn't some, like, forensic case," she says. "You're not going to find some new piece of evidence that will make everything fit together, Tweek. I know what you know."

"I just thought!" Tweek looks at Jimmy, hoping for backup, but Jimmy's just fiddling with his crutches. Tweek wants to be mad at Jimmy, but he can't really be, not fully. Jimmy's a good guy, and on some level Tweek knows he's being  _petulant_. But—still. They don't understand. They can't understand, what it's like to not only be gay, but to have your heart not just broken but annihilated by the first and only boy that's ever really mattered.

"Please," Esther says. "For us. I really, really,  _really_ want to go."

Tweek sighs.

"Don't you want to go, Jimmy?" Esther asks.

Jimmy turns away from his crutches, looking at her. "Yes," he says, though Tweek can tell he's not too excited about the prospect, either.

"Fine!" Tweek says, tossing his hands up. It's not quite a twitch. "Fucking—fine! I'll go to the party, but you'll see. It's gonna  _suck_."

A grin appears on Esther's face as quickly as flicking on a light switch. "Oh, thank you Tweek, thank you thank you  _thank you_ ," she says, knotting her hands together. Jimmy looks at her, and in his eyes Tweek can see the genuine love that sometimes makes being around him and Esther difficult. "Okay, so—it's Saturday, it starts at 7. And we're gonna stay at Bebe's grandfather's cabin 'till Sunday. I have the address, I'll drive, I'll pick you guys both up at Jimmy's cabin at 5:30, 'cause it takes about forty-five minutes to get to the cabin and I don't want to be late—"

Tweek's head is spinning with the information, and he knows he'll never remember all of it. He exchanges a look with Jimmy, hoping Jimmy understands to text Tweek all of this later. Tweek will have to ask his parents to take the night off Saturday, but he's sure they'll do fine without him. Tweak Bros. is not exactly a booming enterprise.

The lunch period ends in ten minutes and Esther fills the rest of it by rehashing the same old South Park gossip and wondering how everybody will get along come Saturday. They have so little information to go on, just what they've gleamed through Facebook and the grapevine. Nobody really talks about or with them; they fly low, and they don't cause any drama themselves. Tweek is okay with that, but not with the circumstances that have caused that.

Tweek has three classes—History, Spanish and Biology—and then he's free to go home. He takes the bus, since his parents work and he doesn't drive. He's one of the only seniors that do, which would probably be embarrassing if everything about his life wasn't already embarrassing. He curls up on a seat towards the back with his earbuds and his phone, watching anime he's downloaded off Netflix. The signal through the mountains gets spotty.

He's fifteen minutes into an episode of Attack on Titan, a show he's already seen several times, when Jimmy messages him on Facebook.  _Sorry for taking Esther's side but I was thinking about it and I really do think it'll be fun. If nothing else we have each other._

Tweek pauses the show and messages Jimmy back.  _It's okay. Just send me the details._

_Just be at my house tomorrow 5:30. Esther says 'wear something nice.'_

Tweek scoffs.  _Like a tuxedo?_

 _Hahahahahahahahaha you got the jokes._ Then, a few beats later:  _Esther says 'party clothes.' I do not know what those are. To be honest I don't think she does either._

 _Googling it._ Tweek does. The results are for women, and then he specifies  _for guys_. A few articles come up and then they're far enough out from the city that he loses reception. An article has loaded, so he reads it, thinking about Craig the whole time. Craig wears these types of clothes. It makes no sense to Tweek, because as a child Craig had dressed so normally, even a little dorkily, and now in high school he wears slim-fitting jeans and shirts with rolled sleeves and black bomber jackets. Tweek will wear a button-down and jeans, like he wears everywhere.

At home he has the house to himself, so he goes up to his room. He lays in bed with his laptop on his stomach. First he checks Tumblr, where he runs an anime blog that has 1,162 followers. He's gotten a new message asking his opinion on the recent developments in a manga that's one of his main fandoms, which he answers. He scrolls through his own blog for a few pages, admiring it, and then he sighs and opens an incognito tab. He's not feeling very creative, so he opens PornHub and goes to one of his favorite videos, a gangbang with lots of close-up shots in a language Tweek does not speak and is relatively sure is Slavic. In his head, he thinks it's Czech. All the guys are kind of ugly, burly and old, but they have nice cocks, and if they're old and burly and ugly, Tweek can't superimpose himself and Craig onto them.

After a relatively lifeless orgasm Tweek goes back to Tumblr and browses through his dash. He's almost completely forgotten that he'd been texting Jimmy, and that he'd agreed to go to his first (and probably last) high school party until he gets another message. It pops up in the corner of his screen:  _EARTH TO TWEEK_

_oh shit sorry_

_Nah it's cool. Esther just wants to get double confirmation._

_u with her?_

_yeah doing homework ; )_

Tweek's eye twitches. He knows about Jimmy and Esther's sex life, though Jimmy doesn't really brag about it. Tweek pretends to be disgusted but he's abstractedly fascinated, not only because it's straight sex but because it's  _any_ sex, a degree of separation away from him. He has not been with anybody since Craig. He's been toying with the idea of Grindr, but he's pretty sure the only guys that would have them out here would be gross, closeted, old Mr. Garrison types.

_cool. need to ask parents. sure they will say yes_

_KK let us know_

_will do._

Tweek closes out of the Facebook tab, not wanting to be social in this moment. He wishes he could take an after-school nap, but sleep has never come easily. He casts aside his laptop and goes downstairs to make a pot of coffee. While it brews, he walks out onto the back patio. There's snow on the ground, but it's not too cold today. He stares at the spot that the hammock had been. He had asked his parents to get rid of it, feeling so terribly that he had begged for it for months and then had thrown it aside. In a way, Tweek feels that he  _is_ that hammock, some momentary fascination for Craig to be discarded, to disappoint itself and everything else around it.

He goes to retrieve the coffee. He knows that this image of Craig he's built in his head, of some sort of cruel supervillain who exists to make Tweek's life miserable, cannot possibly be the reality. Yeah, he hears from other people that Craig's an asshole. From the few stories and anecdotes he's heard, it seems to be in that careless way—that Craig really doesn't care, not that he actively exerts maliciousness. Effortlessly mean. As effortless as  _that's too bad, Tweek._

Tweek pours the coffee in a mug, drinks it black, his palate practically erased after so many years. His appetite never improved, and he never grew much past the day he Craig broke up with him. Sometimes, Tweek considers that option: was it just that Craig wasn't attracted to him, even beyond sexuality? Tweek feels pretty neutral towards his appearance, which makes it easy for him to see how somebody wouldn't want him. Jimmy tells him he looks fine, and so does Esther, but they're nice and they don't count.

Jimmy's theory is that Craig thought he got too cool for them. Tweek puts credence into that theory, but not a lot, because he knows that in his own way Jimmy is heartbroken, too. Having your peers shift from accepting you and your disability to shunning you for it is not easy; Tweek knows this, because Jimmy has told him this. But Jimmy's cheerful exterior rarely breaks, while Tweek feels like he walks around like some sort of quivering, wailing, Victorian ghost, one who has drowned and is doomed to track water for the rest of eternity.

 _But_ , Tweek thinks bitterly as he pours more coffee in his mug,  _Jimmy has Esther._

Annoyed with himself and his thoughts Tweek takes the mug of coffee back to his room. He settles back in and opens the TvTropes page for a series he'd recently finished, glad to see that the page is lengthy, with multiple available subpages. It should keep him occupied until his parents come home and fix dinner; he can ask him about the party then. While he reads he picks at a loose thread on his blanket. Jimmy doesn't message him back.

His parents come home at 8, the usual time, and his mother serves them a meal she'd been slow cooking all day. As is the weekday ritual, emblematic of the sad, repetitive nature of Tweek's life, he thinks as he looks down on string beef and vegetables.

"Something on your mind, Tweek?" his father asks.

Tweek looks up. "I got invited to a party," he says.

His parents exchange looks, and then his father says, "A party?"

"Yeah." Tweek's fork is shaking in his hands. "Bebe Stevens is hosting an—ah, Christmas party!" The fork drops onto his plate. "At her grandfather's cabin! Tomorrow!"

"Well, Tweek—do you want to go?" That's his mother, staring at him like he's playing some sort of joke on them.

Tweek picks his fork back up. "No," he said. "But I have to. For Jimmy and Esther. I promised!"

"Alright, then. What time is it?"

"I have to be at Jimmy's at five thirty."

"That's fine, Tweek. I hope you have fun." His mother smiles.

Tweek grunts and twitches in response. He shovels steamed carrots that taste like everything else on his plate into his mouth, not wanting to upset his mother. Both his parents look so hopeful, their eyes bright, none of the suspicion Tweek feels clouding their faces. The last time Tweek felt that, Craig turned his life upside down; now, he thinks, it will not be flipped right back up, but perhaps shaken like a snow globe, the dust settling to reveal some impossibly bleaker future.

After dinner Tweek retreats into his bedroom. He puts his headphone on and plays Hearthstone for five hours, listening to Mitski songs and thinking hard about Craig, as he is wont to do. Sometimes when Craig looks at him he feels like Craig is trying to communicate something. A dark shadow will flicker in his eyes, just a second, just an infinitesimal twitch of his jaw, a slight curl of his lip. Sometimes Tweek tells himself that Craig wants him back; sometimes this turns into a weird, sexual fantasy; mostly Tweek thinks that even after all these years Craig is disgusted by him and congratulating himself on shedding Tweek's dead weight. Tweek loses most of the Hearthstone games and then reads Reddit posts about needed nerfs, abusing the upvote and downvote buttons but never himself posting.

More aimless browsing through Tumblr and then it's time for bed. He curls around his pillow, eyes heavy with tears that he has not cried since Craig broke up with him. The world is cruel, he thinks. Unfair. As usual, his mind drifts to Jimmy as proof of this concept. As usual, he feels guilty immediately. He falls asleep jumbled up in this mess of his thoughts, this tug-of-war of emotions, his hand ghosting along his lips and begging to be sucked. Tweek sucked his thumb for much longer than usual, so long it fucked up his two front teeth, and it's only by sheer force of will that he has not returned to the habit.

He has long, complicated dreams that he's at the horse races with Craig, and that Craig has placed far too much money on a horse Tweek is sure will lose. He keeps trying to tell Craig this, to beg him to rescind the bet, because their livelihood is at stake, but Craig has Tweek's mouth locked in a wire muzzle. He wanders around the stadium as the announcer calls the names of the horses; the announcer is Jimmy, and he stumbles over every letter, taking forever. Tweek feels annoyed: hot, vicious annoyance, the emotion so strong it can only be experienced in dreams. No resolution comes; he pokes into every corner, tries to beg strangers to take off the muzzle, and nothing works. When he wakes it's slow, rolling onto his side and pulling the blanket over his head to try and go back to sleep, his body still so tired, but it evades him. With a dramatic sigh he gets out of bed.

It's early, seven thirty, and his shift at his parents' shop starts soon. He showers and shaves, thinking of the party later, but the razer nicks a spot on his jaw due to how badly his hands shake. He curses and presses a washcloth into it, staring at himself in the mirror. Like this, in the bright light of the bathroom, he understands why Craig broke up with him. He looks like an impression of a person who had died from a drug overdose. He didn't really need to shave, even. His facial hair amounts to just a few thin, scraggly patches.

When the bleeding stops he dresses and walks to work, wishing he'd get over his driving hang-up. The day at work passes by slowly and usually, his parents buzzing with an energy Tweek can only assume is because of their son's newfound—and temporary—social life. Tweek mixes drinks, takes order, refills coffee pots, puts up stock, munches on croissants and drinks cup after cup of black coffee.

He leaves at five. He's spilled creamer on the shirt he was going to wear to the party, so he heads back home and changes, looking at his bed longingly. The temperature has dropped severely, so he throws on a cardigan and changes his coat out for his proper, heavy winter coat and wears boots instead of sneakers. It's probably overkill, and he'll probably be looked at strangely, but Tweek has barely any body mass and chills easily.

At Jimmy's house, Jimmy's mother greets him with a smile and Tweek squeaks out a hello before dashing into Jimmy's room. Sometimes Tweek thinks he moves about the world like a pursued ingenue in a horror movie, all quick feet and slamming doors and heaving chests. Of course, Jimmy is used to this by now, and he sets his headset aside and swivels around in his chair to wave hello at Tweek.

"Ed-ed-editing," Jimmy says, gesturing to the screen behind him.

"Yeah!" Tweek says.

"You wanna watch?"

"Sure thing." Tweek throws his coat on Jimmy's bed and walks over. The sketch Jimmy's working on is about a McDonald's drive-through; the humor is reliant on Jimmy's stutter. It ends with a catastrophe of several spilled drinks. It's funny, but as with most sketches from Jimmy's troupe, it makes Tweek feel vaguely uncomfortable.

"How much do you have left to edit?" Tweek asks.

"Not m-m-much," Jimmy says. "Just a few sound effects. It'll go up to-tomorrow night."

"Cool." Tweek checks the time; it's a quarter after five. He wrings his hands and goes to the bed, sitting beside his coat.

"You nervous?" Jimmy asks.

"Yeah."

"Cr-Cr-Craig?"

"Of course." Tweek flops back on the bed. Only afterwards does he think about his hair, bemoaning its constant state of disarray, the fact that he actually doesn't care at all.

"Can I say something, my fr-friend?"

"Okay." Tweek closes his eyes, preparing for Jimmy to tell him that he hates Tweek and wants nothing more to do with him.

"You need to move on from Craig. He sucks. He's an ass-asshole. You can do way better." Jimmy's voice rises, then falls, on the last sentence. "We can  _all_ do b-better."

Tweek measures his breathing, trying not to sigh or twitch or scream, the constant war he fights with himself. They have had this conversation before. Jimmy knows his arguments. And despite their constant searching, they have uncovered nothing new about Craig, nothing that will solve the case and bring peace back to their lives. Perhaps that does mean that Tweek should move on; but Tweek's more inclined to believe that it has stuck him in this cruel limbo. That, despite what Esther says, there is some missing piece of evidence, something that will make everything fall into place.

"You're not the only gay guy at Park Count-County," Jimmy continues, which  _is_  new information.

Tweek bolts upright and looks at him. "Who?!"

"I know at least two," Jimmy says, smiling. "Soph-sophomores."

"Ugh." Tweek scrunches his nose. "I'm a senior, Jimmy!"

Jimmy shrugs. "But," he says. "Maybe there's a closeted jun-junior or sen-senior. If there's three, there has to be more."

"It's no use. I'll be alone forever."

"Tweek," Jimmy says gently, frowning at him from his computer chair.

"It's true, Jimmy! I—I suck, okay! All I do is sit around and watch anime and make coffee, I look like a fucking meth addict,  _my name is Tweek_ —" Tweek starts into his tirade of usual complaints when the doorbell rings, indicating Esther's timely arrival. They hear the door open, the lilt of Jimmy's mother's and Esther's voices, and then Esther comes into the room in her usual flurry.

She has her hair up in a bun and she's wearing skinny jeans that are tucked into a pair of Sorels. As usual, she looks much too cool for Jimmy and Tweek. She's all smile as she gives Tweek a hug and then goes to Jimmy to give him a kiss. "Ooh, what are you working on, babe?"

Jimmy shows her the sketch and she laughs loudly, appreciatively, as Tweek scrolls through Tumblr on his phone and absorbs nothing. He perks up when he hears his name; it's Esther, asking him if they're ready to go. He puts his phone away and says, "As ready as I'll ever be!"

"Tweek with the dramatics," Esther says, fondly, and then they roll out into the night: Esther in her skinny jeans and boots, Jimmy with his crutches, Tweek twitching and with a little spot of dried blood clinging to his jaw. To be uncool is one thing—but to be uncool and to be cognizant of it is a thing entirely in itself.


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey what's good? sorry for disappearing. i wrote two theses this year and went through some stuff, so not a lot of time to write. so i'm fifteen minutes late with starbucks, but hopefully, i've brought enough starbucks for the whole class (i mean that i hope this chapter is good enough after such a long hiatus.)

******Part III. Floating Glaciers, Crashing Into One Another, Causing Continental Change**

 

 

On the way to the party Tweek rides in the backseat, feeling like a child with their parents. Snow starts to fall about ten minutes into the drive. Large, lazy, slow flakes, sliding down the windows of the car. Esther announces its arrival with surprise, and when Jimmy laughs she shoots him a quick look and says, "I know, I know, it's the mountains in December."

"Rain on a wedding day is good luck," Jimmy says. He has a hand resting in between the seats, waiting for Esther, but Esther is a careful driver. Tweek appreciates it, his own hands balled on his knees.

"Who's getting married?" Tweek snorts.

"Not us." That's Esther. "Not yet, at least."

"Agreed." Jimmy smiles at her, like it's a private joke. Tweek detects no bitterness in this exchange. A few people in their senior class are engaged, some wear promise rings. They laugh at them without irony.

Closer to their destination the snow thickens. Instead of drifting it slips sideways, slamming against the car with soft, smothered sounds. Esther and Jimmy are discussing something in the front seat—possibly the weather—but Tweek can't hear them; with the arrival of the exterior storm comes an interior one, snow drifts building behind his eyes. They're pretty far up in the mountains, a high elevation, and Tweek knows he's going to be  _so_ cold when he gets out of the car.

"What's the time?" Esther asks.

"Twenty t-t-till seven," Jimmy supplies, checking his phone. The time on the clock in Esther's car got all fucked up, somehow, and none of them know how to fix it.

"Right on time." Esther sounds relieved.

"I doubt anybody else will be there! Isn't it cool to be late?" Tweek asks pleadingly.

"Fuck if I know, Tweek," Jimmy laughs.

"I don't want to be late. It makes me anxious. Doesn't it make you anxious, Tweek?" That's Esther, briefly finding Tweek's eyes in the rearview mirror. When she catches him, she winks.

'Time is a construct."

"That sounds like Craig," Jimmy says. He's right. It's something Craig said to Tweek, once, years and years ago. Time is a construct, we've invented it. Tweek thinks that Craig was trying to comfort him about something—the specifics of the conversation are lost in the black nether of memory—but all Tweek had said was  _so what, what does it matter, we've invented it, but we have to live by it!_ This had been in a Wikipedia-fueled philosophical phrase of Craig's, and he responded something about cultures with cyclical views of time, where you could show up hours late for a meeting and nobody would care, and Tweek slammed his hands against his ears in a rare moment of just wanting Craig to  _shut up._ They'd been twelve, Tweek thinks.

"Whatever." Tweek flops back against his seat. "God, I don't want to see him."

"Well, you'll probably see him, but you don't have to  _talk_ to him. Just stay with us!" Tweek can hear the increased hysteria in Esther's voice, the faux-cheery act she puts on when she's nervous. "We'll just—we'll make an appearance! We won't be out too late. Is anybody drinking? I'm not, of course. Because I'm driving."

"No," Jimmy says. "I can't, with one of my me-meds."

"I know that," Esther says, more to herself than anybody else. "Of course I know that! What about you, Tweek?"

"No," Tweek says, also. "I've—I've never drank! And I don't want to start now!"

"God, we're—we're such fucking  _losers_!" Esther punches the steering wheel with one hand. Her driving remains steady as the snowfall outside, and the car is quiet with no radio playing. Tweek and Jimmy exchange a look, Tweek's heart about to jump out his mouth and make a run for it.

"Sweet—sweetheart." Jimmy puts the hand that had been on the console on Esther's shoulder. "Ca—calm down."

Esther breathes in so sharply Tweek wonders if it hurts her chest. "I'm sorry, Jimmy. Tweek, too. I'm so sorry. I don't know what I was thinking. I haven't talked to those girls in years! Bebe's doing this fake nice thing, she used to do it back in middle school, too—but the thing is,  _she isn't nice._ I think—I think it was her, that convinced everybody else to start ignoring me after Dad, and—and she used to buy me snacks from the vending machine, and—" Esther's voice is starting to break. Tweek presses himself back into his seat even further, wishing it would absorb him completely.

"Do you need to p-p-p-p-"

"Pull over?!" Tweek  _knows_ he's not supposed to guess what Jimmy's saying, knows that Jimmy hates it, but the situation is reaching a critical level in this car and somebody has to say the word. Much like Tweek's twitches, Jimmy's stutter can sometimes be worsened by distress, and  _distress_ might be too calm a word for everybody at this moment.

"No. No." Esther shakes her head, her hair slapping against her cheeks. "I'm fine." Jimmy squeezes her shoulder, and for a moment she breaks her precious concentration to smile at him. "Really, I'm fine, Jimmy."

"We're al-almost there," Jimmy says, relaxing into his seat. Tweek lifts his back off his own. "And—like you s-s-aid—we can leave soon."

"Yeah." Tweek watches as the tension in Esther's shoulders leaks out. "Yes, of course. We can leave. We're not  _trapped_ here." She laughs.

"Don't jinx it!" Tweek twitches, grabbing onto the console as he does.

"Everybody needs to re-relax," Jimmy says. He turns on the radio, some Top 40 song Tweek vaguely recognizes floating out. "Let's listen to the ra-radio, yeah?"

With no other alternatives, they do. The air in the car has grown heavy and thick, nearly palpable. It's not that anybody is mad at  _each other_ , Tweek thinks—Esther freaked him out a little, sure, but Tweek knows she has these mood swings, sometimes, since her father died, and Tweek's anxious about this whole thing, too, so  _Tweek_  certainly isn't mad at anybody—but maybe they're all mad at themselves. Or the circumstances. Tweek feels more like a useless third wheel than ever. If he weren't here, surely Jimmy would be able to comfort Esther. If he weren't here—Jimmy would never be in this place to begin with. It was only because of the falling out that Craig cut Jimmy off, and without Tweek, Jimmy would probably be happy. Tweek twitches again, one of his legs leaping out to kick the inside of the door.

The road begins to thin and the trees close in on them, light evaporating as easily as morning dew. Tweek is not unfamiliar with this phenomenon, a mountain boy born and raised, but this certainly isn't helping the current situation developing inside the car that will possibly—probably—carry on into the cabin. Tweek unbuckles his seatbelt and moves from the middle seat to behind Jimmy's, looking out the window for the moon. He is disappointed when he can not find it, the tips of the trees ahead lacing their fingers above the roughening road.

When Esther had said the party was being held in Bebe's grandfather's cabin in the mountain, Tweek had imagined a claustrophobic, two-room dinghy of a building and not the sprawling luxury that stands before them, pouring its orange lamplight into the otherwise impenetrable darkness. He exits the car and feels the gravel of the driveway crunch beneath his boots. There are other cars here, already, cars Tweek recognizes: Token's immaculate, old-styled Lincoln, Craig's trendy little Subaru, Stan's rust-colored Chevy truck with mud splashed on the tires. Looking at these, and whipping his head back to Esther's nondescript, unintimidating Honda Civic, Tweek is nearly knocked over by the impression of living in third person. Here are the idols of the people whom he is supposed to know, but who somehow live outside his world, leaving Tweek to wonder: is it them, or  _him_ , that is the ghost?

He hears the thud of Jimmy's crutches on the gravel. He hears Jimmy curse. Esther has his hands around his arms, but Jimmy shrugs her off, wordlessly. Tweek toes his shoe around in the gravel; it's loose, and underneath it the land unsteady. Tweek flushes, feeling ashamed and enraged on Jimmy's behalf, that this is a consideration Bebe should have taken.

"I'll be fine!" Jimmy finally tells Esther, glaring at her. Tweek flushes again, his head starting to feel light from the continuous rush of blood and emotions. "Jesus, Es-Es-Esther!"

"I'm sorry, I'm sorry," Esther's saying, the platitude becoming a whisper as she continues. "I just—I'm so stressed, and—Jesus fucking  _Christ_  —"

Jimmy's walking now, though, even if it's at a slower pace than usual, testing the ground with his crutches before committing. Tweek falls in line beside them, while Esther hovers by her car for a few moments. "This fucking blows," Tweek says.

"We need to stay pos-pos-positive," Jimmy says bitterly. "Maybe it won't be so bad."

Tweek jerks to the side, then stops, struck both by a twitch and an idea. "An hour and a half!" he proclaims to Jimmy, and the intimidating behemoth of a cabin, and the dark, surrounding wood. "We can stay for an hour and a half."

"That's thirty minutes, three times," Esther informs them, coming up to stand on Jimmy's other side. "That's ten minutes, nine times. That's doable."

"I've seen that m-m-meme too." Jimmy smiles at her, good nature and good humored restored, and Tweek smiles, too. Paranoia still beats is bedraggled wings inside his chest. Tweek knows better than to give into the false security of appeasement and optimism.

They slowly make their way to the porch and then pick up speed, Jimmy easily able to navigate the smooth hardwood. The door of the cabin has a knocker that Esther pulls, letting the echo of stone against wood beat out into the night. A bird flies out of a tree. Tweek thinks of Dracula.

Bebe answers the door, already looking a bit lit up. She's wearing a Santa ha that has fallen half-off her hair, much too voluminous for such an accessory. She pulls Esther into a hug. "I'm so glad you came!" she says.

"Oh my God, me too." Esther beams at her. Tweek cringes.

"Come on in, come on in." Bebe steps to the side. Esther goes first, and then Jimmy, receiving a smile from Bebe. Her eyes pass over Tweek's head—she's wearing heels—as Tweek walks in.

The inside of the cabin is spacious; though two stories, the upstairs is more of a loft, with impossibly high ceilings and exposed wooden beams on the first floor. Tweek feels like he's watching an episode of one of those cabin-hunting shows on HGTV, as if some overeager real estate agent is going to tell him that it doesn't have a spa tub or adequate space for a mancave, and it's two hundred thousand over his budget, but isn't it  _wonderful_? Bebe prattles on about what drinks she has, and Esther smiles and accepts a beer, pretends to drink it.

To the left of the entrance is a large living space with overstuffed white leather couches, everything draped in animal furs with their accompanying busts staring at them accusingly from the wall, a fireplace crackling like a million tiny gunshots. Tweek's blood goes cold. Craig and Token are sitting on one of those couches.

Craig looks good, of course. His hair looks recently cut, the razor marks still on his neck. His ears are red at the tips, as is his nose. He's holding a drink in a red Solo cup. He's wearing tight khakis, the type that stretch and form those tantalizing lines over the crotch, and a denim jacket over a retro-faded t-shirt; Tweek can't quite make out the logo on the chest. He thinks it's an extinct soda brand. Beside Craig, Token has an ankle over a knee and an arm across the back of the couch, a beer in his other hand. They look natural, effortless; it pains Tweek to think he used to be in that picture, that he  _should_ be in that picture, tucked underneath Craig's arm with his nose buried against his armpit, protected, ignored not because he is ignorable but because he is Craig's, and people know not to mess with what is Craig's. Craig can be, as Tweek has learned,  _vindictive._

"Do you want to see the back porch? It's  _un-believe-able_ ," Bebe is saying to Esther while Tweek grabs onto a nearby hall tree and tries not to pass out. Jimmy has a hand on his back. "Or would you rather get something to eat first?" Bebe laughs; Tweek recognizes it for what it is. He looks at Jimmy, exchanging fire in their eyes, both wishing they could clobber Bebe over the head with an umbrella from the hall tree.

"Let's go to the porch." Esther laughs too, nervously, running her finger along the rim of the beer bottle.

To get to the porch they must pass by Craig and Token. Tweek can feel Craig's eyes on him the whole way. As predatory as the wolf's bust on the wall; Tweek feels like one of the deer busts, glossy-eyed and on display for everybody to see him for what he is, a victim, prey.

The back porch is unbelievable, Tweek has to admit. Large, made of beautiful wood, lit up by string lights, a hot tub under cover on a corner, a vista of the sprawling mountains, though hard to discern through the increasingly thickening snowfall. There's no fence to prevent the rather steep fall from this small peak, and Tweek frets, tugging at his own hands. He's imagining everybody drunk and tumbling off the cliff one-by-one, no catcher in the rye there to save them.

"Where's your—uncle? It's his cabin?" Esther is asking Bebe. They've ventured off the deck, toeing the snow, but Tweek hovers by the door.

"My grandfather," Bebe says, then shrugs. "Some national convention thing in Denver he goes to every year. This year, my parents finally convinced him to let me have it." She turns from Esther and screams towards the mountain in the distances: "To  _party_!"

Esther laughs. Jimmy, still with Tweek, elbows him in the side. "Fake," he whispers.

The door slides open and Tweek jumps sideways, prepared to dart under the nearby scruff, a mountain hare, if it's Craig. It's not Craig; it's Butters. He's followed by Cartman, a person Tweek consistently forgets exists, so little do their circles overlap. They both have beers and they're talking about the latest World of Warcraft patch. Tweek bites his tongue. He has opinions on that, knows nobody cares

. "Butters! Eric!" Bebe lopes past Esther to greet them. "When did you get here?"

"Just now, obviously," Cartman says, huffing between words. Bebe laughs like it's a joke.

They go back into the house. Tweek looks at Jimmy, and then at Esther, Esther dwarfed by the panorama of eternity surrounding her. He pictures barreling at her, knocking her over the edge. Going with her. Taking Jimmy. Escaping. Not death, really—Tweek doesn't want to die—but he does want to get out of here. An hour and a half; he might as well have signed his death sentence.

"You're looking melodramatic," Esther says, frowning, as she approaches them. Her boots make heavy sounds on the stairs. She never learned to readjust her step after losing weight, walking like she's carrying an extra sixty pounds.

"I'm  _fuh-feeling_  melodramatic." Jimmy moves a crutch, pulls Esther towards him. "How many min-minutes has it been?"

Tweek pulls out his phone. No notifications, of course. "Five," he says. He locks his phone but keeps it in his hand.

They reenter the cabin. Butters and Cartman have taken another couch, sitting beside Stan and Kyle, whom Tweek cannot remember if he saw while coming in or not; Craig and Token have seemingly not moved; Bebe is flittering about, attending to things Tweek can't comprehend. Jimmy and Esther go for the third and final couch. Tweek has no choice but to follow. As soon as he sits down—directly opposite Craig, because life is a cruel mistress—he pulls out his phone and opens Instagram. Cute animals, photography, anime, tattoo artists, various hot bland guys with hair that is  _not_ black—his feed is predictable. He filters out conversation. He shrinks into himself, he tries to disappear, he practices astral projection and imagines himself snuggled up in his bed, protected by the warm arms of his blankets. Sometimes before he falls asleep at night he imagines somebody spooning him from behind—and that somebody is always Craig, with the bony, elastic arms he had at fourteen, not the normal almost-man across from him, not the one with the cold eyes, but the one with the smell of burgeoning testosterone rolling off him in waves and making Tweek dizzy and aroused in ways he didn't have names, didn't have concepts, for, yet.

"Jimmy, Tweek, do you guys want anything?" Bebe's voice interrupts Tweek's thoughts. She's already holding out red Solo cups. Tweek looks at them. He does want it, actually, but he shakes his head anyway. Across the expansive wooden coffee table, Tweek thinks he can detect a change in Craig's facial expression—the beginning of a suppressed scoff, maybe.

"Can you  _believe_ that assignment Lieberman gave us?" Kyle is saying to Esther. He has his feet on the coffee table, Tweek notices, which makes Tweek shrink back in himself even more, take up less space.

"I don't think it's that bad." Esther picks at the edge of her sweater.

"I do," Kyle says, harrumphing and crossing his arms over his chest. "Who wants to spend their break doing a thirty-page reading packet like we're in the seventh fucking grade?"

"Y-y-you know," Jimmy interjects, putting his hand over Esther's, stilling her. "Tweek and I have a really d-d-d-difficult English p-p-paper. Too."

"They don't respect break, man," Stan says. He speaks slowly and Tweek thinks his eyes look a little red. Stoned? Tweek doesn't know, has no context to know.

"I'll drink to that." Kyle makes a toast with nobody.

More people filter in, slowly: Kenny; Red and Millie; Wendy; Kevin Stoley and Clyde. Tweek gets up and follows Jimmy to the kitchen at some point, to peruse the snacks, and in the process they lose their seats on the couch. While in the kitchen Tweek leans into a corner facing away from the party. "Awful," he mutters, speaking half into the wood.

"Hm?" Jimmy looks up from the cheese tray. "W-w-what, Tweek?"

"Awful!" Tweek hisses, trying his best to keep his voice low. His head jams into some molding, a little balloon of pain popping against his temple. "This is awful. What were we thinking? Who are these people?"

"Our c-c-classmates." Jimmy frowns. He leaves the cheese plate, walks over to Tweek.

"I don't recognize them," Tweek huffs.

"Tweek? Are you okay?"

"Oh—no, no, I know who they  _are_." Tweek sighs, turns away from Jimmy. "I just mean. We don't really know them. Anymore! Stalking isn't the same as talking!" He jerks at the unintentional rhyme. "They're so—different! I don't know! I feel like, I don't know what I feel like. I feel like they're all judging me and totally not seeing me  _all at the same time_."

"I know that feeling," Jimmy says gravely.

Tweek pulls out his phone. It's been thirty-five minutes since they've arrived. "Fifty-five minutes," he says. "Fifty-five minutes, and then we can leave."

"I don't think it's as b-b-bad as you're making it out. I mean. Craig and those guys s-s-suck. But the others are talking to us, and they're nice."

"Stan? Kyle? Cartman?" Tweek snorts. "You want to be friends with  _those_ guys, Jimmy? They almost got Craig killed in elementary school! More than once!"

Jimmy shrugs a shoulder. "Maybe if they had, things would be better." When Tweek doesn't laugh, he prods Tweek in the shoulder. "Just a j-j-j-joke."

"Not funny," Tweek mumbles, shouldering his way out of the corner to go see what's set up on the kitchen island for the snacks. He takes a baby carrot. "I'm still pissed about the guinea pig thing."

Esther comes in then, a high flush in her cheeks. Tweek thinks that maybe she  _did_ finish the beer, which would mean they're all fucked, as far as getting home goes. "They're playing Truth-or-Dare," Esther says, both hands finding loose threads in her sweater. "They specifically requested Tweek's presence."

" _Who_ requested T-T-Tweek's presence?" Jimmy swivels around, furrowing his brow.

"Clyde."

" _Clyde_?" Tweek leaps back from the island as if Clyde had appeared there, ready to kill him. " _Clyde requests my presence_? What the  _fuck_?"

"I don't know!" Esther's hands fly up. Jimmy grabs one of her wrists, holding it. "I don't fucking know, okay, they told me to go come get you guys, that it's like—a tradition, at their parties, or something, and you all have to play."

"I don't have to do anything!" Tweek steels.

"That's true, that's true, but look—maybe it won't be so bad—let's just do it."

Jimmy looks at Tweek, asking without words, and Tweek has one of those rare moments of incredible fondness for one's best friend. Jimmy knows Tweek probably the best of anybody, and Tweek knows that if he said no, Jimmy would say no, Esther would say no, and then they would all leave and cement their place as the biggest losers in their school, in their town, possibly the planet. Tweek knows that he should be happy to have good friends, even if they're all losers—he's seen the movies, read the books, watched the anime, that features such plots. But he can't help but shake the feeling that something is wrong with his social situation, that he's been blinded, robbed. And, always, that thought: Jimmy and Esther have each other. Tweek has them, but not in the way they have each other. Tweek wants somebody else—one other person—one  _specific_ person, and then, just then, maybe, it would all be alright.

"Okay," Tweek exhales.

Stan offers Jimmy his seat beside Kyle on the couch, which Jimmy takes. Esther and Tweek sit in front of him, on the floor. There are others on the floor, too—Kevin Stoley, Wendy, Kenny, Millie, Red—but Tweek still feels self-conscious, too small, and as if he's been put in the wrong place. He can feel Craig's eyes on him, the steady and steely eyes of a predator lying in wait.

Bebe stands up, holding a wine glass that's too full; some of the liquid inside spills out and she giggles. Tweek notices Wendy rolling her eyes, and then Bebe starts to speak. "Okay, this game of Truth-or-Dare is a little different. You can choose not to take a dare or answer a truth, but if you do that, you have to take a shot."

"So it's a drinking game," Stan comments. He's sitting beside Tweek, in front of Kyle, now; Kyle kicks him gently in the back and whispers  _you knew that already;_ he has to be stoned. Tweek watches him somewhat fascinatedly. He's never even seen weed in real life.

"You all know the rest of the rules, right? I'll start." Bebe looks around, squinting, seeking a target. Tweek's heart starts to pound. "Red," she announces, finally.

"Dare," Red answers immediately, smiling.

"I dare you to read the last text you sent."

"Oh, easy." Red takes her phone and flicks the screen a few times. " _God, I hope Stan actually shows_. I sent it to Millie." She and Millie look at each other, snickering.

"Cool," Stan supplies, nodding at Red. She nods back.

"Okay." Red claps her hands together and turns, pointing. "Clyde!"

"Yeah?'

"Truth or dare, dumbass," Red laughs.

"Oh. Dare." Clyde straightens up, as if bracing.

"Hmm." Red taps her lips and turns to Millie, who leans in to whisper something in her ear. "I dare you to shotgun two beers in a row."

"Lame," Clyde says, standing. He goes to the kitchen as Red calls out, "We have to start slow!"

"Says who?" Kenny asks, raising his eyebrows.

"Says, like, everybody. Duh." Red shakes her head.

Clyde returns with the beers and pulls out a switchblade from his pocket; Tweek twitches at the sight of the knife, but Esther grabs his knee hard, prevents it from being visible. The attention is on Clyde, anyway, as he punches a hole in the first can and brings it to his mouth. The classic  _chug! chug! chug!_ chant starts, and he soon finishes that beer, throwing it to the side. He wipes his mouth and repeats the process, a bit slower the second time, then ends with a belch.

"Sick, dude," Token says.

"So easy." Clyde shrugs and takes his seat again. "Alright. Who wants to go?"

"That isn't how you play!" Bebe laughs too loud and smacks Clyde in the head, leaning over the couch he's sitting on. "You have to, like, what's the word—when a teacher calls you out? Like, randomly?"

"Cold-calling," Kyle says. "She's right. It's stupid if you ask."

"Fine, fine." Clyde waves his hand. "Okay, uh, Craig, I guess."

"Of  _course_ you pick Craig," Token says.

"Can everybody shut up so we can play the stupid game?" That's Kyle, again. Everybody talking, so loud, at once, Tweek feels like his ear canals are about to collapse.

"Chill, chill. I choose dare, obviously." Tweek, given permission to look at Craig through the fact that Craig is talking, and everybody is looking at Craig, does so. Craig is looking at Clyde, waiting for the dare, but Tweek swears he sees his eyes flicker towards his for a split-second. He can  _feel_ it, more accurately, the connection like a lightning bolt straight to his chest.

"I dare you to go get more beer." Sounds of protest start up from nearly everybody—a lame dare, etc.—until Clyde says, with strange and uncanny coldness and precision, unlike what Tweek has ever heard from Clyde before, "with Tweek."

Silence falls. Everybody turns to Tweek.

He yelps and twitches, of course, what the fuck else would he do? All of the eyes, the growing murmur and unsure giggles, the collective, shared knowledge—they all know, they were all  _there_ , in the stupid fucking elementary school when Craig and Tweek declared, publicly, over and over again, that they were boyfriends, until they  _were_ , and then they  _broke up_ , and now Tweek is a  _loser_ , and Craig is  _cool_ —

"I don't have a fake I.D.," Craig intones.

"Oh, that's okay!" Bebe perks up. "There's this little store, at the other side of the mountain, it's just like, a fifteen minute drive. I know the guy that runs it. He doesn't card! This is perfect, Clyde, what a good idea, we need more, anyway."

"Do I have to pay?" Craig continues. "'Cause if I have to, I'm not. I'm fine. I'll take the shot."

"Don't be a spoilsport," Bebe whines. "Here, take my card." She takes a credit card from the pouch on the back of her phone, waves it. "Seriously, we're running low. It's perfect."

"Fine. Fine. Whatever." Craig stands up.

"Wait, before you go—ask somebody else!" Bebe says, moving her head so erratically the Santa hat slips off. She appears not to notice.

"Uh." Craig looks around. "Kevin."

"Truth."

"Oh, fuck, I don't know." Craig rolls his eyes. "What's your favorite color?"

" _Craig_!" Bebe admonishes.

"I'll just take the shot," Kevin says. "Classic Craig, man."

 _Classic Craig._ Tweek has to admit, it  _is_ classic Craig, not to care about Truth-or-Dare, to give a bullshit question, to get things over with.

While Kevin pours a shot from a bottle of vodka on the coffee table, Craig nods at Tweek. "Come on, Tweek. Let's go."

The sound of Tweek's name is Craig's voice—Craig's  _new_ voice, his  _adult_ voice—and Tweek is surprised he does not spontaneously combust. There was a period in middle school where everybody was obsessed with that—with the idea that you could just explode, randomly, cease to exist, blood and guts everywhere. Spontaneous combustion. Combustion engines. Tweek is pretty sure he could power an entire plant on the speed of his heartbeat.

"My coat," Tweek says, feeling like he might start crying, or possibly throw up. "I don't know where I put my coat."

"My car's heated," Craig says. "I'll go in. It doesn't matter."

 _How are you having this conversation?_ Tweek is thinking as he stands up, stumbles over everybody's legs, leaves the living room, Craig taking Bebe's card, following him to the front door. How is he doing this, how is he pretending like this isn't world-shattering, earth-turning, universe-spinning? Tweek feels dizzy as he opens the door. The cold slaps him in the face, sending every nerve standing up, saluting this strange occurrence. He hears Craig start his car remotely, the beeps too loud in the silent, cold night, and he screams, involuntarily.

Craig says nothing. He used to comfort Tweek, or respond to his screams, somehow. Instead, now, in this awful, wretched present, he shuts the cabin door behind him and walks to the driver's seat. Tweek makes his legs move to the passenger side, thinking—if they had dated when Craig started driving, would he have opened the door for him? Tweek cannot recall ever seeing Craig and Melissa together near a car, has no point of reference. Just like the sight of weed in real life. A whole wealth of things from which he has been forbidden.

The first few minutes pass in silence, Tweek stunned, Craig driving. Syllables of words and fragments of sentences bubble up in Tweek's throat, and he keeps thinking he should say something, but he can't string anything together. He's afraid if he'll open his mouth he'll start screaming again and never stop. The seats of Craig's car are heated, but Tweek still feels so  _cold_ from the few seconds of exposure. Why hadn't he pressed the point about his coat? He just went along with whatever Craig said, whatever Craig did, as if attached to him by the strongest rope, unable to move independently. Nobody consulted him. Nobody questioned him. It wasn't his dare—it was Craig's. It isn't his life—it's Craig's, and Tweek is just living in it. Tweek groans and grabs at his temples, putting his head between his knees.

"Are you gonna puke?" Craig says, finally.

"No," Tweek says from between his own knees. "I'm—sorry!" He straightens back up.

"Okay."

The drive is definitely not  _just_ fifteen minutes—Tweek swears it's been twenty, and there's no end in sight. He didn't look at the time when they left, but he's passed at least ten since thinking to look at the clock on Craig's car. He checks his phone and sees that service has died. His anxiety ramps, and he just  _knows_ , knows like he did back when he was fourteen and about to be dumped, that something is going to happen.

"Well," Craig says as his headlights illuminate an expanse of snow that does not actually look like a road, "I think we fucked up."

" _We_?" Tweek screeches.

"I think I took a wrong turn. You didn't say anything."

"How was I supposed to  _know_?" Tweek screams. "Can't you—back up, or something?"

"Yeah, I'm about to do that." Craig turns the wheel—a three-point turn, Tweek thinks—and gets about halfway through the maneuver when the car lurches in a funny way. Craig frowns, tries to move the wheel. Tweek can hear the sound of tires spinning futilely against the snow. The sound ramps up, then sputters to a stop, as Craig sighs and puts the car in park.

"You've gotta be fucking kidding me, man," Tweek says. He pushes the door open and sees that they've somehow gotten themselves stuck in a snowdrift, the ground indistinguishable; the air is so  _cold_ , so windy, and the snowfall is quickening, nearing blizzard conditions. He pulls the door shut again.

"Don't do that. We have to keep the heat in."

Tweek balks at him. He forgets, for a second, that this is  _Craig_ , that this is the person that his both his deepest desire and worst nightmare, in the flesh, sitting impotently in the car, and instead becomes angry at the utter  _ridiculousness_ of the situation Tweek has found himself in. "Craig, we're gonna fucking die out here!"

"No we're not. No. We're not."

"It's a fucking blizzard—"

"It's not a blizzard yet."

"Oh, I didn't know you were a meteorologist."

Craig  _laughs_ , and though the laugh is not cruel, that ancient, tortuous soundbite  _that's too bad, Tweek_ comes back, strong and fierce, nearly knocking him into the car door.

"It's not funny. I'm not being funny. We're gonna die! They're not gonna find us!"

"They'll figure it out," Craig says. "Besides, I have blankets in the trunk, Jesus, I grew up in the mountains, I know how to keep my car prepared."

"Oh, so we'll wrap ourselves in the blankets, and then we'll die of dehydration in three days."

Craig takes a measured breath. "No," he says. "You're being ridiculous. Calm down and think rationally."

 _The old Craig wouldn't say I was being ridiculous_ , Tweek thinks. He would understand. He would suggest something constructive, something realistic, to take Tweek's mind off things. This new Craig, though—the same old empty platitudes and snide accusations Tweek always hears, from everybody. Tweek has two images of Craig in his head, the cruel and the kind, the real and the fake, and any illusion he might have that Craig must be harboring some deep secret, some residual fondness for Tweek, is about to shatter. The real Craig, the one in front of him, staring at the various gauges and meters of his car—that image, that reality, is being strengthened.

"Are you feeling calmer now?" Craig asks, turning his attention back to Tweek.

"No!"

"Look, okay, not everybody there is shitfaced. Somebody will notice that we're gone and figure we must have taken a wrong turn. There's like, two turns on this whole road, they'll figure it out. We just need to stay put and keep warm."

"Stay put and keep warm," Tweek scoffs. He turns from Craig and looks out the window; he can't see anything, it's so dark, the snow falling so heavily. He can hear, though, and he hears the whipping of the wind in the trees above, the crack of weaker branches, the sound of snow accumulating.

"Yeah. I have half a tank. We can keep the car running for now."

The sound of the engine. The sound of the pads of Craig's finger tapping his steering wheel, quietly, in a rhythm.

"If we talk, we'll be able to keep it warmer. With our breath."

"I don't want to talk to you," Tweek says. "We haven't talked in years. I have nothing to say to you."

"Oh, I'm sure you have plenty to say to me." It's the fact that he says it a little sadly that gets Tweek to turn from staring out at the snowfall to look at him. His face is as even as ever, and it has been years, but you don't spend a large chunk of your life dating somebody without learning their habits, their micro-expressions, the subtle shifts of their voice. Craig said that  _sadly_ , distinctly sadly, as sadly as Craig would have said it at an awkward age fourteen.

"You're not the same person." It's an accusation and a reminder.

"I'm pretty sure I am, actually." Craig's arms relax, his grip on the steering wheel sliding, but Tweek only tenses further.

The quiet feels oppressive. Tweek wants to scream, to fill it. He has never liked the quiet, has never been able to stand it, he sleeps with a white noise machine in his room like a literal infant. He and Craig used to listen to rainforest sounds when they had sleepovers, the geriatric and now-dead bird Tweek had inherited from his grandfather cawing back at the sounds of his brethren. Now Tweek listens to any setting but the rainforest one, entirely alone.

"Please talk," Craig says finally.

"I don't have to do what you tell me."

"I'm not telling you. I'm asking you."

A few beats pass before Tweek can make himself say, "I understand that we broke up," measuredly, slowly, shuffling through the archive of things he does indeed want to say to Craig, "but I don't understand why you and everybody else started being so  _mean_  to me. And to Jimmy." His voice gets shriller towards the end of the sentence and his fingers are moving on their own against his leg and he's vaguely nauseous, but he  _said_ it.

Craig exhales through his nose. The car is still warm, their breath still invisible. Ironic, Tweek thinks—this should be a tiny pocket of stillness and calm, something to preserve and keep that way, like a terrarium, and instead he feels this car is going to become a bomb, explode, with angry heat, heat that will not warm Tweek but sicken him to completion, to death. That is the only possible conclusion Tweek can expect—death from exposure, to the elements or to Craig.

"Look, Tweek. I need to say—there's not a day that goes by where I don't think about you."

Tweek recoils, shocked by the response, and then shocked by the contents of the response. He narrows his eyes. "You fucking liar."

"I'm really not lying." Craig unbuckles his seatbelt and shifts as much as he can in his seat, opening his body towards Tweek. Tweek keeps himself bent, as far away as he can, and still tethered by his own seatbelt. "I—I'm sorry about what we did."

"That's real great, Craig. You ruined my life, and now you're apologizing for it."

"Please don't say that." Craig looks at his hands. "Your life isn't ruined. I—I've been an asshole, okay? I admit that. I've been an asshole and a coward. I fucked up. What else do you want to hear?"

"None of this!" Tweek shouts. "I don't want to hear any of this! You can't just do this, Craig! You can't just ruin my life and then say sorry, that's not—that's not how it works! I can't just follow you around forever, like I did, fuck, I can't do this, I can't—"

Craig leans forward and grabs Tweek's hands, brings them together on the console. Tweek remembers Jimmy and Esther, the way Jimmy's hand would rest there, waiting for Esther's, whom he had to know would never hold his hand while driving, but that gesture, that openness. Craig's hands are cool and smooth and large, enveloping Tweek's. His nails are short, his cuticles maintained. The only imperfection, a callus on each thumb.

"I made Clyde dare me that," Craig says, closing his eyes. "I arranged this whole fucking thing, Tweek. I didn't know how else to do it. I knew you would be mad. I had to get you alone."

Tweek rips his hands from Craig's, his heart beating so loudly he's having trouble distinguishing thoughts and voices and making sense of anything. He takes a few seconds to parse, feels his cheeks flush. "So you took that turn on purpose? So you endangered our lives?"

"No, no, no—let me explain!" Craig gestures towards one of Tweek's shoulders, then lets his hands drop back to the console. "I did fuck up when I took the wrong turn, okay, that wasn't part of the plan. We were just going to go to the store, and I'd get the beer, and then—I was trying to build up the confidence. To talk to you."

"This is really rich, Craig.  _Confidence._ You're so confident. You're the coolest guy at school!"

"That doesn't  _mean_ anything!" The rise of his voice, the curl of his lips, is slight, but Tweek picks up on it anyway, hates himself for still knowing Craig so well.

"It means a lot," Tweek says. "It ruined my life. And Jimmy's life. And Esther's life."

"I had nothing to do with Esther," Craig says. "I don't know what the girls get up to. I never talk to them. Only at parties."  
"What about Melissa, huh?" Tweek's stomach seizes as he asks.

"It's complicated. It has nothing to do with you."

"What do you want, Craig?" Tweek's throat thickens. "What do you want from me?"

"I want you to listen to me," Craig says, eyes downcast.

"But  _after_ that," Tweek presses. "Am I just a toy to you? Something to throw away and take back whenever you want? I'm not a toy, Craig. I'm a person."

"I know that. I know you're a person, Christ." Craig exhales and stretches, his knee pressing into the console. "I know you're smart, and you're kind, and you're a hard worker when it matters. I know I fucked up. I wasn't ready. I mean, really. We were only fourteen. I barely knew myself then, you barely knew yourself. What were we doing? Why did they let us do that?"

For all the thought Tweek has given what happened between him and Craig, the years they spent together and the years they spent apart and that awful moment that drove the wedge between, Tweek had not looked at it from that angle. They had been only fourteen, yes, and sometimes things were awkward, and sometimes things didn't really click, and sometimes they stumbled, but Tweek never doubted Craig at his side. Never wanted for or wondered about anybody or anything else. This whole time, instead, he has thought that there was something wrong with  _him_ , something Craig clued into, something that pushed Craig away. Even the excuse that he gave, that he wasn't gay—that never sat right with Tweek, because that would mean that there was an external reason. That would mean that there was nothing that Tweek could have done differently. That would mean that there was nothing Tweek could spend the last three and a half years putting himself through the wringer for.

"I freaked out," Craig continues, when Tweek doesn't respond. "I freaked out, and I fucked up, and shit changed, and I didn't know how to fix it. It all got out of hand."

"I've  _been_ here," Tweek says. "You could have just talked to me. Three years ago! Not now, in the snow, on—on some stupid fucking dare!"

"I was  _scared_. Everybody expects things of me. I'm supposed to have moved on. But I didn't, and it was my fault in the first place, and I knew you'd be mad. I let it go on too long." Craig turns away from Tweek and folds over the steering wheel. "I shouldn't have done this. It's not fair, to you."

"Don't do this." Tweek pushes the words through his teeth. "Don't. Don't manipulate me."

"You're right, you're right." Craig lifts his chin. "Look, I said what I needed to say. If you hate me, and you've moved on, then that's fine. I understand."

"Of fucking  _course_ I haven't moved on, Craig!" Tweek grabs for his hair. "I loved you! I loved you  _so much_ , and I thought—I thought you loved me too!"

"I did!" Craig sucks in a breath. "But I wasn't ready! We were just blindly running towards it, and I wasn't ready, and nobody stopped us. It was the opposite, they all encouraged it. I just—I wasn't ready. I thought, maybe I wasn't gay, but that's—that's not it."

"Oh, really?" Tweek asks, unsure how else to proceed.

Craig sucks his bottom lip through his teeth, then lets it go, the air thick and quiet. Tweek notices that even with the heat running, it's starting to feel a little chillier. He's about to start worrying about dying out here in the snow with Craig, again, let that become his main focus and not the emotional mess of a banquet Craig is laying out for him here, when Craig speaks. "I never had sex with Melissa."

The confession leaves Tweek dumbstruck. It takes a few moments before he can sputter out, "What?"

"You heard me. We never had sex." Craig's not looking at Tweek, and Tweek can see the slightest color enter his cheeks, right along the ridge of those sharp cheekbones. "I didn't want to. I didn't like her."

"Why were you with her, then?" Tweek balks. He has assumed Craig has been having lots of sex, this entire time—mostly as a way to reflect on all the sex he, himself, is not having, and specifically the sex he is not having withCraig.

"Compulsory heterosexuality?" Craig tries. "I don't know. She liked me. She came onto me. It was a distraction. From—from all of this. I thought, maybe. It just didn't work."

Tweek weighs this information, unsure how Craig wants him to proceed, or even how Tweek himself wants to proceed. He lets his curiosity win out. "So you're a virgin?"

"Well, no."

Tweek looks down at his feet, tries to figure out if he wants to know who Craig had sex with or not. Of course he wants to know; he wants to know everything about Craig, rediscover the things he already knows, find out what's changed, see if Craig is still Craig at his core or really some new, intangible person, forever foreign to Tweek, a language he cannot and will not learn to speak. He  _wants_ , constantly and all-consumingly, when it comes to Craig. He just doesn't know if he can  _have_. He wants to believe, doesn't know if he can.

"I had sex with a guy," Craig supplies. "You don't know him. He doesn't go here. I met him when we went to a party in North Park. It was just—a hook-up." He, too, looks down then, running the palms of his hands over the steering wheel in a way Tweek shouldn't find arousing, especially when Craig is talking about having sex with somebody who isn't him, a  _male_ somebody who isn't him. "I wanted—I wanted to see. If I'm gay. What other way do you find out then by having sex with a guy, right? Well, I'm gay. And it was fun. But he ghosted me after. And." Craig swallows, his hands stopping on the steering wheel at four and eight. "He wasn't you."

Tweek groans.

"I know," Craig whispers.

"You  _don't_ know," Tweek says. "My whole life, it's just—it's been nothing! Since you!"

"I know!" Craig says, more loudly. "How many times do I have to say it, Tweek?  _I fucked up, I'm sorry_ , and—"

"And what, Craig?"

"And I love you," Craig says, calmly, holding Tweek's gaze.

"You love me?"

"I love you. I loved you then. I love you now."

People talk a lot about the feeling of coming home. Everything pleasurable and slightly nostalgic is coming home. The smell of your mother's cooking; the feeling of a warm bath; Christmas decorations in Target. Tweek, too, has been guilt of this overused phrase, of succumbing to everyday comforts, of inflating them far beyond their true meaning. When Craig kisses him, he understands for the first time, what  _coming home_ is. It is this: Craig's cold nose yet warm breath nudging against Tweek's own, his hand on the side of Tweek's face, the whistling of the snowy wind outside the car.

"See?" Craig says when he pulls back.

Tweek cannot see. Tweek has been blinded.

Craig moves a piece of Tweek's hair, tucks it behind his ears. "I never forgot about you," Craig says, speaking as softly as a deer skipping over recent snowfall.

"It just—it  _feels_ like you did." Tweek turns from Craig, curls his nails into the palms of his hand. He doesn't want to lose all he wants to say, though the words are draining from his brain in a steady stream. He doesn't want to dissolve under Craig's command, like he always has—

"I know." Tweek turns back to Craig, dumbstruck. "I've been an asshole. I hate myself for it. I do. I just didn't know. What to do." Craig takes his hands from Tweek and puts them back on the steering wheel, uselessly, staring at the dashboard now. "How do you fix something you broke yourself? Wait, that's stupid. That doesn't make sense. I just—I'm trying to make you see—what type of asshole would I be if I came back years later like, hey, did you put your life on pause for me, because I have my shit together now?"

"I did put my life on pause for you!" Tweek cries out. "You—you paused my life! I haven't done  _shit_ , Craig, I'm not living! I play video games and watch anime all day! I don't—I don't go to parties, I don't drink, I don't smoke weed—"

"It's not all it's cracked up to be," Craig mumbles. "It actually all kind of sucks."  
"Easy for you to say," Tweek hisses. He's still holding onto all that residual anger, trying to ignore the way Craig's face has softened, the tone of his voice, and the way he can see, somehow, in his side profile, the Craig of fourteen, gangly, awkward, walking on shaky legs like a newborn fawn, metaphorically if not literally. "It's so easy for you to say, Craig. You went on your little journey, you found yourself, and you expect to find me right where you left me, and you  _did_. Are you happy, now? Does it make you happy, knowing I've been here waiting for you?"

"No." Craig takes one of Tweek's hand again, runs his finger over the little bones. "It makes me fucking depressed. It makes me hate myself. A lot. I had to do something, before we left. I couldn't live on, knowing what I did to you. Melissa, that's fine—she already found Kenny, she doesn't care, it was never serious. The same with that guy. But with  _you_ —I dream about you, Tweek. Every night. Okay, maybe not every night. But a lot."

Tweek thinks about being cruel, about being sarcastic, about taking his hand away. About not believing. He thinks about going against everything he wants. But—he  _knows_ Craig, still, after all these years, and—he was  _right_. Craig had been watching him just as closely, had been suffering just as much, in his whole way. But—

"I just can't believe you," he says.

"How can I make you believe?" Craig asks. He cups Tweek's cheek with his other hand. "You can ask Token. He knows. I told him. And he's been telling me to talk to you for years."

"You should have listened to him," Tweek says. He doesn't lean into Craig's touch, but he doesn't back away, either. "He was always so—smart!"

"Nobody has changed." Craig speaks evenly, soothingly, calmly, his voice working in conjunction with his hands, kneading all tension from Tweek's body, as effortlessly and easily as rolling the dough for cookies at the coffee shop. "Have you?"

"Of course not," Tweek responds, immediately. "I never—look—don't make me start talking about that!" He jolts. Craig follows him with his own body, keeping everything in place.

"Still the same old Tweek."

Holding onto the little energy he has left for this, Tweek asks as bitterly as possible, "And Jimmy, Craig?  _Jimmy_? He didn't deserve that!"

"Look—I have nothing against Jimmy. But he sided with  _you_. And I wasn't going to leave you without a friend." Craig squeezes Tweek's hand.

"I am not friends with Jimmy because of you."

"I never make fun of him, okay?"

"But you don't tell people to stop, either."

Craig sighs. "Everybody wants to be liked," he says. "Even me."

"I liked you," Tweek says. It comes out more like a whimper. "I liked you so much."

"I couldn't handle it." Craig lets go of Tweek's hand and his cheek and cradles his own head, putting his elbow on the steering wheel. Tweek finally unbuckles his seatbelt, draws his knees up on the chair. He already misses the feeling of Craig's hands, familiar and foreign at the same time, a language from Tweek's youth he craves to relearn.

They sit like that for a few minutes, Tweek thinking about taking Craig's hand, about pulling him in for another kiss, and being too scared to lean across the way. He looks in the backseat; it's clean, nothing there. He thinks about the promise of the blankets in the trunk. All that separates him from this blizzard is the hull of this car, and if he were to open the door, he would be there—back in the world again. He has never been in Craig's car before. It feels fake; it feels like an illusion Tweek has dreamed himself into, and if he thinks too hard about it, he could lose it. So, yes, the blankets, and the real world, outside, through the snow; but here, in this car, with this boy, a fragile sort of beginning. A terrarium, freshly planted.

"Show me," Tweek says, finally, softly, hanging all of his wishes and wants and everything on these words. "Show me that you still care."

As Craig slowly, so slowly, unfolds himself and leans back towards Tweek, Tweek feels like he has detached, floated above the car, and has started to watch the scene below unfold in an isometric view. Yet he feels entirely present in his body, too, possibly too present, as Craig grabs him around the back of his head and pulls him in, kisses him again. Deeper, this time, with feeling. He holds Tweek close to him, practically pulling him over the console. Two skinny boys, they make it work, even if Tweek's left leg bends at an odd angle over the console and his elbow keeps catching on the steering wheel. Craig holds him tightly, kisses him fiercely. It's nothing like how they used to kiss, way back then, as children. That was tentative, fresh, new—Tweek can feel the experience Craig has since gained. Tweek tries to focus in on the moment, tries to decipher what Craig is telling him through his body, turning his own body into a raw lightning rod and waiting to be lit up.

Craig moves his hands down Tweek's back, and muscle memory reminds Tweek of that one time, that time that he thinks about so often, when they were making out and Craig stuck his hands down his pants. So long Tweek has used that as a stick to beat himself with—as proof that Craig  _must_ have been attracted to boys, because he'd seen so sincere and so embarrassed in the aftermath, hiding his face from Tweek as Tweek tried not to laugh and kissed at his nose, his cheeks. It's one of the worst memories, one of the ones Tweek only dredges up and indulges in when he's at his absolute lowest, in the cool, dark tomb of his room, late at night, unable to sleep, feeling sick with misery.

More than anything Craig could have done, more than the hardness Tweek can feel forming in his pants and all the words they've been throwing at each other about changing and staying the same and feelings and cowardice and lives ruined, what Craig says next finally makes Tweek believe. He moves his mouth down Tweek's jaw so he can then pull away, say something, rubbing his nose in the juncture of Tweek's neck, clearly talking to be heard. "Like that time when we were kids."

"Oh my God." Tweek exhales and sits back, astonished. "You remember."

"Of course I do." Craig pinches his eyes shut, pulls Tweek to him once again. "I remember everything. I remember it all. I miss it all. I hate myself for what I did. For what I said. That's too bad, Tweek—really? Like, who was that dick?"

"You," Tweek reminds him. They're speaking into each other's mouths, their noses bumping, their eyelashes touching. "That was you. This is you."

"I know. That's the worst part." A few breaths pass between them, and then Craig says, "Can you forgive me? Will you take me back?"

Tweek laughs, because—because that's never how he imagined this happened. He always imagined himself crawling to Craig, groveling for forgiveness, promising to be better, and Craig indulging him with various levels of kindness or cruelty depending on Tweek's own mood at the time. It never occurred to Tweek that he would be the one asked to make this decision. And now, having that power, he thinks.

"I want to," he says. "But you have to promise to take me back, too. And Jimmy. And Esther."

Craig swallows and nods. "Done," he says. "They should—at the party. They should be being nice to them. I told them. If they don't, it's not me. It's them."

"It's you," Tweek says, not in response to that, but in response to the fact that it is Craig beneath him, holding him, Craig on which he is resting, Craig which is propping him up, keeping him warm. Snow batters the car. Wind sends the branches fluttering. And Craig holds Tweek.

"Okay, this is a lame come-on," Craig says, moving his face away from Tweek, just like he did all those years ago. "But you feel really cold, and—if we, you know, have sex—but I understand. If you don't want to. Right now. It wasn't in my plan, actually. But, uh. It's fucking cold. And. I missed you, like this."

"I want to," Tweek says, feeling like he's speaking with his heartbeat. "This is perfect. I swear. I want to."

They go very slowly and carefully, approaching their first time in the way Tweek thought they would before they broke up—tentatively, nervously, reverently. Tweek trembles and shakes, from the cold and from nerves, but Craig is gentle, and Tweek is gentle, in return. It's better than what Tweek had allowed himself to dream about. They do not cry, and weirdly, Tweek doesn't feel the need to; instead, he feels calm when Craig enters him, feels that he has come back down from the sky and escaped every sensation of his body, that he has collected the lightning as the lightning rod. Like floating into a cave holding hands, knowing you're connected in face of any adversity—that is how Tweek feels, how he felt then, and how he feels now.

Afraid to leave the safety and warmth of their embrace in the aftermath to get the blankets despite how cold it's getting, Craig buttons Tweek into his jacket. They'd not fully undressed but Craig has lost his shirt denim coat and Tweek has unbuttoned his, so they lay chest-to-chest, heartbeat-to-heartbeat, curled up and cramped in Craig's car, keeping the fragile warmth they've worked up between them. For what feels like hours, they do not talk. Tweek starts to slide towards something resembling sleep, and all knowledge he has of hypothermia tells him that you feel warm and sleepy before you die, and he thinks, if he dies with Craig, like this, maybe, that will be okay—

Then there's a rasping on the passenger side window. Tweek screams and jumps up, hitting his head hard on the roof of the car. His vision goes black and snow starts to fall in the car as Craig simultaneously pulls Tweek back to his chest and unrolls the window.

"Tweek?"

"Esther!" Tweek rips from Craig again, the blackness draining from his eyes. Esther's crouching, looking in the window, confused. "Oh my God, we're not going to die!" Tweek smiles and opens the car door, bringing Esther in for a hug. "Craig, we're not going to die!"

"I told you," Craig says.

"It smells like sex in here." Esther pulls away from Tweek and peers around, crinkling her nose. She sees Tweek's unbuttoned shirt, watches as Craig retrieves his from the backseat. "Oh—oh my God, Tweek. You didn't."

"It's okay," Craig and Tweek say at the same time. Craig pulls his shirt on. Tweek keeps talking. "Really, it's okay, Esther—I'll tell you and Jimmy about it, it's okay! We're not going to die!"

Esther sighs. The lack of happiness on her face confuses, depresses Tweek. "Your car must be stuck," she says to Craig, her voice cold.

"Yeah," Craig says. "I drove into a snowbank. And I think something went wrong with the engine."

"God." Esther shakes her head. "Whatever. It's late and it's cold. Let's get back to the cabin."

Craig confirms he doesn't have cell service and therefore would be unable to call his insurance or a tow service, and Esther confirms that she is not in the mood to help them push Craig's car out of the snow. Craig takes his keys and they tie an old shirt Craig has in the trunk around a tree branch, indicating where they've left the car. It was a wrong turn, an abandoned service road with unclear signage, invisible in the snow. Esther takes the way back properly.

"Where's Jimmy?" Tweek asks. He's sitting in the front seat, Craig in the back.

"I didn't want him to come. The snow, and his crutches—if I had to go looking for you two, I didn't want him to have to struggle." She says this pointedly, catching Craig's eyes in the rearview mirror.

"That's smart," Craig says.

"How come just you came? If you had to come looking for us—that's dangerous!"

"Everybody else is drunk or high," Esther says tersely. "I wasn't going to go traipsing through the woods. I was just looking for the car."

"You found us, man! And we didn't die!"

Esther does not respond to this.

"Did anything happen while we were gone?" Tweek tries.

"Well—" Esther takes a deep breath. "Last I checked, Bebe was throwing up in the bathroom with a really, really annoyed Wendy, I think Red and Stan hooked up, Kyle and Cartman got into a fight about something, Kenny left because Melissa called him, and Token and I had a stupidly long conversation about A.P. Art History."

"Cool," Craig says. Tweek turns to see him smiling in a faint way. "That all sounds pretty usual."

"Jimmy is really worried," Esther continues, ignoring Craig's response. "He was worried that Craig would do something, or that you would die, Tweek—you shouldn't have gone! You should have taken a shot!"

"Esther!" Tweek twitches, his shoulder going into his ear with shock. He becomes aware how much his head hurt, from hitting it, accompanied by an uncomfortable, unfamiliar and more intimate pain, presumably from having sex. He tries to keep his lease on everything, even as all of this starts to click and connect and become real in his head and his body.

"I just—Jesus, Tweek! We were  _so close_!"

"This is a good thing, Esther!" Tweek shouts back. "This is—so good!"

"Close to what?" Craig asks from the backseat.

"Graduating!" Esther shouts. "Getting out of this shithole high school in this shithole town with these shithole people! We were  _so close_ , and then you—you've just ruined everything, you know that, Craig?"

"So I've been told," Craig deadpans.

"Craig," Tweek pleads.

"It's okay, really, Esther," Craig tries instead. "I am going to start dating Tweek again."

"And I  _know_ Tweek is going to say yes," Esther says, laughing a little. "He's like—putty in your hands! You're an asshole, Craig, a real asshole!"

"Hello?" Tweek asks, looking between Esther and Craig. "I'm right here? I made the decision, Esther! I can make my own decisions!"

"I know that," Esther says. "I know that. Look—we'll talk about it with Jimmy, okay?"

"There's—there's nothing to talk about, I'm  _doing_ this, I  _did_ this." Tweek tugs at his hair. He can hear Craig sigh.

Jimmy's waiting in the entryway when they return, leaning against the wall, Tweek's coat folded on the floor beside him. His eyebrows narrow when he sees Craig.

"Please let me explain," Craig says.

At the same time, Token and Clyde come into the entryway, drawn by the sound of the door. Clyde claps Craig on the shoulder; Craig does not reciprocate, but he doesn't move Clyde's hand, either.

Token grins. "What took you so long?" he asks.

"We got stuck," Craig says, finally shrugging Clyde's hand off. "I took a wrong turn, like a dumbass."

"Bro," Clyde says, nodding.

"We never made it to the store, so. No beer."

"That's okay," Token says. He throws a thumb over his shoulder. "The party's winding down, shit hit the fan. I'll tell you about it later."

"Thanks," Craig says. "Could you guys—leave us alone, for a second?"

Token nods and gives Clyde a look. From what Tweek can tell, Clyde is very drunk; he stumbles after Token, asking him why they're being thrown out, Token saying they're not being thrown out of the party, just out of that one specific room.

"What happened?" Jimmy asks as Esther goes to his side, wraps her hands around one of his arms.

"We got stuck," Tweek says, "like Craig said. And—we talked, and we worked things out, and—we're going to start dating again!" He tries to keep his voice down, though he doesn't think anybody is listening to them, everybody seemingly concerned with their own problems.

Esther leans in and whispers something to Jimmy. Jimmy scowls.

"Before you say it, I know I've been an asshole." Craig raises his hands, shows his palms. "I am fully dedicated to making up for that."

Jimmy keeps scowling. "I c-c-can't forgive you, for what you did to Tweek, and for what you did to m-m-me."

Craig looks down. Tweek grabs one of his hands, squeezes it.

"Seriously," Esther says, looking between them and Jimmy. "I don't know what you said to Tweek, but—we've been with him, all these years, you know—okay, not me, I came later, but Jimmy  _has_ —and we  _see_ what has happened to him because of you. And what's happened to Jimmy!"

"I watch all your YouTube videos. I give money to your ." Craig looks up, meets Jimmy's eyes. "I never told any of them to stop, that's true. But I never told them to keep going."

"It doesn't make a d-d-difference," Jimmy says.

"Please," Tweek says, leaning in. "Please, guys—I  _know_ he's sorry, okay. Please believe him. I—I didn't, at first! I thought just like you did! But—I know it's for real!" Tweek squeezes Craig's hand again, not out of reassurance, but as a reaction to his own mounting frustration.

"People don't change, Tweek," Esther says. "Once an asshole, always an asshole. Don't you see? How can you—how can you turn around so quickly?"

"You changed," Tweek reminds her. "You—you were so sad, and you were so lost, and look at you now! And Jimmy! You guys, I know, you guys are okay, because you kept on! Jimmy has his YouTube, and you have your school, and you guys have each other!"

"You can't define your life by a r-r-relationship," Jimmy interjects.

"Are you guys going to just stand there and shout sayings at me?!" Tweek looks between them. "I thought you were my friends!"

"We're saying this  _because_ we're your friends! Tweek, seriously. Do you want to get hurt again?" Esther looks at him pleadingly.

"I'm not going to hurt him again," Craig says, addressing Esther. "And I'm not going to hurt you guys, either. I already told everybody to lay off."

"A real h-h-hero," Jimmy disparages.

"Yeah, I know, okay, what does it matter? It fucking doesn't matter what other people think of you, okay? That's a lesson I had to learn." Craig shakes his head. "If being with Tweek makes me a loser, then cool, I'll be a loser, with all of you. If being with Tweek makes him cool, and makes you guys cool, then cool, we'll all be cool."

Tweek looks at him. He can still feel Esther and Jimmy's anger, but maybe, just maybe, there's a little less of it. Or maybe they're all tired and cold and sick of high school. "I think what he's saying," Tweek says, "is that what matters is that we have our friends who really care about us. Not what other people think And that we—that we do right by them, and by ourselves! Right?"

"Yeah," Craig says. "Something sappy like that."

Jimmy sighs, leaning into Esther. "This is a l-l-lot."

"I know," Tweek says. "It is."

"How are you getting home?" Esther asks Craig.

"I was going to ask Bebe if I could stay here and call about my car in the morning, but I've heard she's out of it, so. I guess with Token."

"And you, Tweek?" Esther asks.

"With you guys!" Tweek curls his fingers together. "If—if you'll take me!"

"Of course we'll take you, hon," Esther sighs. She lets go of Jimmy's arm. "I think we should go now."

"Would it be alright if I had a moment alone with him?" Craig asks.

"A m-m-moment," Jimmy says.

As Esther and Jimmy head out and to the car, Craig takes Tweek upstairs. The upstairs area is nice, quiet; they walk into what seems to be a sort of study, connected off the landing by an archway. They sit together on a plush ottoman, next to a loaded gun cabinet. Tweek tries not to take it as some sort of omen.

"Bebe's grandfather is such a redneck," Craig says, noticing what Tweek's looking at. "That convention he goes to is a gun thing. It's stupid."

"Yeah," Tweek says, playing with his hands.

Craig notices that, too, and puts his hands on top of Tweek's. "I hope they come around," Craig says, speaking softly. "I miss Jimmy. His videos are funny. And if he's dating Esther, she must be cool, too."

"She is," Tweek agrees. "She just—she cares a lot!"

"I'm so glad." Craig leans back, closing his eyes again, and Tweek crawls towards him, nearly in his lap. "I'm so glad you have them, Tweek."

"Do you really want to start dating again?"

"Yeah." Craig opens his eyes and looks down at Tweek, smiles. "I really do." He runs a hand through Tweek's hair, fingers getting caught in knots. "You know, it's like I'm living in some bizarre world that's showing me what my life would be like without you. And it fucking sucks. It's stupid. There's no point. I hate going to all these fucking things, you know? I hate that I have to. I missed you so much. Every time I'd go somewhere, I'd be like, what would Tweek have to say about all this? I'd see a meme or something and I'd want to send it to you."

Tweek smiles back.

Craig leans down and kisses him, long and slow and steady. It's a kiss of promise, a reconnection. Together, linked, hand-in-hand, otters, they will enter a cave, they will exit a cave. Tweek will leave the cabin, ride home with Jimmy and Esther. He will do his best to show them that Craig's intentions are pure, are good, and that sometimes he's an asshole for real, and sometimes, or maybe most of the time, he's only an asshole for show. There are things they cannot understand about Tweek's situation; there are things he cannot understand about theirs. But, and Tweek sees this now, part of being friends, being true friends, is looking past what you can't understand, and trying to understand and to support them anyway. If Craig is true, he will know that, too, and if they'll be losers, they'll be losers, and if they'll be cool, they'll be cool.

(Craig is telling the truth; Craig is true. Tweek knows this, then, and knows this, now.)

 

 

_I have found you once more, my lover, in the black sea of inevitability._


End file.
